May
7, 2004
Venezuela buys back $257 million
of domestic debt
(Reuters) - "Venezuela´s government
has repurchased from public sector institutions
around 493 billion bolivars ($257 million) in
domestic debt maturing this year as it pursues
a broad debt refinancing program, the Finance
Ministry said.
The DPN public debt bonds repurchased represented
77.6 percent of the total of 635 billion bolivars
($331million) of domestic debt falling due between
May 10 and Dec. 13 and currently in the hands
of state entities.
In a program to ease a crunch in short-term payments,
President Hugo Chávez's government has
recently bought back around $1.4 billion in domestic
debt using part of the $3.2 billion it raised
through two issues in March of mixed dollar- and
bolivar-denominated debt (…)
The government started a refinancing program for
its public debt at the end of 2002. Since then,
it has carried out more than $7 billion in domestic
and foreign debt repurchases and new dollar bond
issues (…)
