Fitch upgrades Sri Lanka’s Long-Term Local-Currency IDR to ‘CCC-’

Fitch Ratings last week upgraded Sri Lanka’s Long-Term Local-Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to ‘CCC-’ from ‘RD’ (Restricted Default). 

Fitch said it typically does not assign Outlooks to sovereigns with a rating of ‘CCC+’ or below. The Long-Term Foreign-Currency IDR has been affirmed at ‘RD’ and the Country Ceiling at ‘B-’.

The Short-Term Local-Currency IDR has been downgraded to ‘RD’ from ‘C’ following the exchange of treasury bills held by the central bank and subsequently upgraded to ‘C’ in line with the Sovereign Rating Criteria, as we believe the local-currency debt exchange has now been completed.

The following are key rating drivers.

Local-Currency debt exchange completed

The upgrade of Sri Lanka’s Long-Term Local-Currency IDR to ‘CCC-’ reflects the completion of the local-currency portion of Sri  Lanka’s domestic debt optimisation (DDO) plan, launched in July 2023, following the exchange of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka’s (CBSL) treasury bills and provisional advance into new treasury bonds and bills on 21 September 2023.

We assume the debt restructuring will lower Sri Lanka’s gross financing needs over the medium term, in line with the targets under the IMF’s Extended Fund Facility, and support an improvement in the country’s debt metrics over time. Local currency restructuring could accelerate progress towards the restructuring of external debt. 

Government debt remains high

General Government debt and the interest costs faced by the Government will remain high, despite the debt restructuring. Sri Lanka’s gross general Government debt-to-GDP ratio is set to fall only gradually to just above 100% of GDP by 2028, from 128% of GDP in 2022, according to IMF program forecasts published in March 2023, which incorporated a local- and foreign-currency debt restructuring scenario. The IMF scenario forecasts the Government interest-to-revenue ratio will decline to 42% by 2028, from over 70% in 2022.

Lower financing needs

The authorities expect the completion of the local-currency debt exchange to lower Sri Lanka’s gross Government financing needs (GFN)/GDP by about 1.5pp over 2027-2032, according to documents published in July. External debt restructuring, which authorities expect to reduce GFN by an additional 2.6pp, remains critical to achieving the target of reducing GFN below 13% by 2027-2032, from 34% in 2022.

Reduction in terms: 

The DDO on the local-currency debt entailed an extension of maturities on certain categories of domestic debt and offered several options, including nominal haircuts, currency redenomination and maturity extensions. Outstanding treasury bills purchased by the CBSL in the primary market were converted into 10 step-down fixed-coupon new treasury bonds and 12 existing treasury bills.

Stronger revenue generation key

We believe IMF program implementation, in particular fiscal measures, will be central to achieving debt sustainability. The risks remain significant, in our view, as a record of weak revenue generation presents challenges to achieving a faster reduction in the budget deficit and the general Government debt-to-GDP ratio.

Authorities have taken several tax measures since May 2022 to improve revenue collection, including raising the corporate income tax rate to 30% from 24%, increasing the VAT rate to 15% from 8%, and raising fuel excise taxes. This resulted in revenue collection rising 43% yoy in 1H23. Additional measures in the pipeline include removing product-specific VAT exemptions before 2024 and introducing a property tax before 2025.

External metrics improving

Sri Lanka’s foreign-exchange (FX) reserves have been improving, with gross FX reserves rising to $ 3.6 billion in August 2023, from $ 1.9 billion at end-2022, partly the result of IMF disbursements and suspension of external debt servicing. However, without access to international capital markets, the sovereign remains dependent on official financing sources. We expect a gradual pick-up in exports in 2024-2025 after a contraction in 2023. Overseas worker remittance inflows are also rising. We therefore expect the current account deficit to stabilise at 1.6% of GDP over 2024-2025.

Slow economic recovery

GDP contracted by 2.7% yoy in 2Q23, slowing from the 12% contraction in 1Q23. Agriculture and services grew in 2Q23, but industry continued to shrink, although at a slower pace from 1Q23. We expect GDP to contract by 1.4% yoy in 2023 before growing by 3.3% and 3.5% in 2024 and 2025, respectively. Inflation, measured by the Colombo CPI, averaged around 30% yoy until August 2023 but continued the decline from end-2022. The CBSL has cut the standing deposit facility rate by a cumulative 350bp since January 2023. We expect another rate cut before end-2023.

Downside risks to banks easing

The exclusion of banks’ holdings of treasury securities from the DDO has alleviated some of the pressure on their capital positions from weakening loan quality and rupee depreciation as well as any immediate funding and liquidity stresses. We believe any incremental risk to the banks’ capital from foreign-currency debt restructuring is likely to be manageable given their limited exposure to the defaulted sovereign bonds (3.6% of their combined total assets at end-1H23) and high provision coverage.

Foreign-Currency IDR in default

The sovereign remains in default on foreign-currency obligations and has initiated a debt restructuring with official and private external creditors. The Ministry of Finance’s statement on 12 April 2022 said it had suspended normal debt servicing of several categories of external debt, including bonds issued in international capital markets, foreign currency-denominated loans and credit facilities with commercial banks and institutional lenders.