Tag: Finance

July 07, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka has lost money by buying Greece government bonds for its foreign reserve portfolio but returns on other assets have offset the losses, the Central Bank said. Sri Lanka has a de facto peg with the US dollar and aggressive investment strategies involving diversifying out of dollar assets can […]

July 05, 2012 (LBO) – Two sugar mills expropriated by the state last year has begun to burden ordinary citizens with the finance ministry channeling 557 million rupees from taxes extracted from the people to the firms. A mid-year fiscal report to parliament revealed that 550 million rupees had been given to cover day to […]

July 04, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka has spent 70 billion rupees on highways, power, water and sanitation in the first five months of the year, with 50 billion rupees going to roads, a finance ministry report said. The finance ministry in a mid-year fiscal report said 36.8 billion rupees was spent on national roads, […]

July 04, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s state investment promotion agency said it had inked a deal with a Singapore led consortium to build a 3 billion US dollar tourism city in Katana, north of the capital Colombo. Earlier reports had said that Sun City, a South Africa based firm will build an 800 million […]

July 02, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s budget deficit has doubled in the first four months of 2012, with current spending growing at twice the rate of tax revenues and leading to unprecedented reliance on bank financing, official data show. Total revenues grew 7.2 percent to 305.5 billion rupees up to April 2012 from a […]

July 02, 2012 (LBO) – India has committed 740. 8 million US dollars out of 1,015 million US dollars of foreign financing to Sri Lanka in the first four months of 2012, including 275. 1 million US dollars as an outright grant, official data shows. The massive grant, which is unusual in Sri Lanka’s recent […]

July 02, 2012 (LBO) – Legal hard liquor production has fallen 2. 6 percent in the first five months of 2012, from a year earlier, but soft liquor (mainly beer) had risen 12.5 percent the finance ministry said in a report. Sri Lanka had seen a surge in beer sales partly due to stronger tourism […]

June 29, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s consumer prices rose 9. 3 percent in June 2012 from a year earlier, accelerating to a three and a half year high, from 7. 0 percent in May, data from the state statistics office showed. The statistics office said Sri Lanka’s Colombo Consumer Price Index rose 1. 9 […]

June 27, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s first countrywide census conducted after the end of a 30-year war shows the population is 20.277 million, the statistics office said, which is lower than earlier estimates. Earlier estimates put mid-year population in 2011 at 20.869 million with an annual growth rate of 1.0 percent. The census conducted […]

June 27, 2012 (LBO) – Population in Sri Lanka’s northern Jaffna area has shrunk during a 30-year civil war but parts of the former war zone which was not fully under control of separatists had seen above average growth, new census data shows. The first census conducted in the area since 1981, has shown that […]

June 25, 2012 (LBO) – Distilleries Corporation of Sri Lanka, has transferred stakes in a hotel and two plantations to a wholly owned subsidiary in a move that will consolidate non-alcohol businesses in a separate unit. Distilleries Company said it had transferred 54.06 million shares or a 41.7 percent stake in Browns Beach Hotel, to […]

June 26, 2012 (LBO) – An annual economic forum next month organized by Sri Lanka’s Ceylon Chamber of Commerce will have a session focusing on the ease of doing business in the island. The Sri Lanka Economic Summit will be held in Colombo from July 10 to 12, held for the 13th successive year will […]