Tag: Finance

July 8, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s ‘B+’ rating was confirmed with a ‘stable’ outlook on lower inflation and better state enterprise performance despite weak institutions and high debt service, Standard and Poor’s, a rating agency said. S & P said there was a marked improvement in state-run Ceylon Electricity Board and Ceylon Petroleum Corporation […]

July 04, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka will upgrade and maintain roads connecting more than 1,000 villages to the highways and expressways in a 906 million US dollars project with 800 million US dollars coming from the Asian Development Bank, a minister said.Sri Lanka has strengthened its road network especially after the end of a […]

July 02, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s has recorded a budget deficit of 3.5 percent of gross domestic product up to April 2014, and the Treasury said it was expecting to meet a full-year target of 5.2 percent. Tax on interest fell 20 percent as interest rates fell in the economy. The tax revenues were […]

July 02, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka has signed up 678.2 million US dollars in foreign loans in the first four months of 2014 and Japan led the tables giving 342.8 million US dollars for a new bridge to the capital, official data showed. Outstanding foreign debt not counting rupee denominated Treasuries owned by foreigner […]

June 30, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka consumer prices rose 2.8 percent in the 12-months to June 2014 from a year earlier, slowing from 3.2 percent in May, the state statistics office said. Prices during the month rose sharply by 1.1 percent, the highest monthly gain in the Colombo Consumer Price Index seen since June […]

June 29, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s inflation would be 2.8 percent in June and the country now had strong economic growth and a stable exchange rate, Treasury Secretary P B Jayasundera said.Sri Lanka is recovering from a balance of payments crisis triggered in 2011 after the state manipulated energy prices with bank loans which […]

June 26, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Nippon Paint Lanka is pushing into the do-it-yourself market as weak spending power coupled with higher labour costs has led to a slump in demand, officials said. “As an industry we are not doing very well. This is not common to us but even the other companies face […]

June 25, 2014 (LBO) – A Macro Prudential Indicator for Sri Lanka which was downgraded to ‘3’, may be lifted in the future as risks recede, amid slower credit growth, a top Fitch Ratings official said.Mark Young head of Asia Pacific Financial Institutions at Fitch Ratings said with weaker credit growth there was room for […]

June 23, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s banking system is managing the risks of bad loans especially from gold-backed loans but high credit growth targets by some banks are a concern, a top Fitch Ratings official said.Bad loans in Sri Lanka’s banking system spiked after low interest rates up to 2011 set off a credit […]

June 21, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Communist Party recognized Vietnam’s claims to islands which are at a centre of a dispute with China a top official said, amid warnings that Sri Lanka could suffer the same fate from aggressive large nations. “As far as we are concerned we recognize the right of the Vietnamese […]

June 18, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka should look at private partnerships to expand infrastructure, reform state enterprises and strengthen the investment climate by improving rule of law and governance, Asian Development Bank chief Takehiko Nakao said. Sri Lanka’s government is investing about 6 percent of gross domestic product in physical infrastructure which was higher […]

June 18, 2014 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s central bank held policy interest rates at 6.5 and 8.0 percent but urged banks to narrow spreads by cutting lending rates, as credit growth continued to be slow.Deputy Governor Nandalal Weerasinghe said Tuesday such market developments would help bring down interest rates to levels in line with deposit […]