Bahrain Mirror: Recent official data showed that the public debt in Bahrain exceeded 6.6 billion dinars by the third quarter of the previous year 2015, constituting around 52% of the gross domestic product.

The most recent data issued by the Central Bank of Bahrain stated that the public debt in Bahrain increased by 24% on an annual basis compared to the third quarter in 2014, which was 5.3 billion dinars during at the time. It increased by 10.5% on a quarterly basis to reach 6.6 billion dinars during the third quarter of 2015 compared to 6.1 billion dinars in the first half of the same year.

Bahrain raised the public debt ceiling through Decree-laws for 6 consecutive times, as it raised it in 2009 to 1.9 billion dinars, in 2010 to 2.5 billion dinars, in 2011 to 3.5 billion dinars, in 2012 to 5 billion dinars, by the end of 2014 raised the legal limit to around 7 billion dinars, and finally to 10 billion dinars by the end of 2015.

The Kingdom of Bahrain borrowed around 782 million dinars within 9 months, from January until September 2015, from the local market to fund the public budget deficit in light of declining oil revenues as a result of the falling prices of the Bahraini oil in global markets.

Arabic Issue