India’s July-Sept external debt marginally lower at $484.3 billion

India's external debt stood at $484.3 billion for the quarter ended September 2016, showing a decline of $0.8 billion (0.2 per cent) over the level at end-March 2016, due mainly to a fall in commercial borrowings and short term external debt.

However, on a sequential basis, total external debt at end-September 2016 increased by $4,768 million from the end-June 2016 level, data released by the Department of Economic Affairs of the finance ministry showed.

An analysis of the maturity pattern of India's external debt indicates dominance of long-term borrowings. At end-September 2016, long-term external debt accounted for 83.2 per cent of India's total external debt, while the remaining (16.8 per cent) was short-term external debt.

Long-term debt at end-September 2016 was placed at $403.1 billion, showing an increase of $1.4 billion (0.4 per cent) over the level at end-March 2016. Short-term external debt witnessed a decline of 2.6 per cent and stood at $81.2 billion at end-September 2016.

Valuation loss (depreciation of US dollar against the Indian rupee and most other major currencies) was placed at $1.0 billion. This implies that excluding the valuation effect, the decrease in debt would have been higher by $1.8 billion at end-September 2016 over the end-March 2016 level.

The government's (sovereign) share in total external debt stood at 20.1 per cent while the share of non-government debt stood at 79.9 per cent, at end-September 2016.

US dollar denominated debt accounted for 55.6 per cent of India's total external debt at end-September 2016, followed by Indian rupee (30.1 per cent), SDR (5.8 per cent), Japanese Yen (4.8 per cent) Pound Sterling (0.7 per cent), Euro (2.4 per cent) and others (0.6 per cent).

The ratio of short-term external debt by original maturity to foreign exchange reserves stood at 21.8 per cent at end-September 2016 lower than the 22.6 per cent at end June 2016 and 23.1 per cent at end-March 2016.

On a residual maturity basis, short-term debt constituted 42.0 per cent of total external debt at end-September 2016 (42.4 per cent at end-June 2016 and 42.6 per cent at end-March 2016) and stood at 54.7 per cent of total foreign exchange reserves (55.9 per cent at end-June 2016 and 57.4 per cent at end-March 2016).

The ratio of concessional debt to total external debt was 9.4 per cent at end-September 2016, same as at end-June 2016 and a marginal increase from the 9.0 per cent at end-March 2016.

Fiscal deficit at 86% of full-year target

India's fiscal deficit during the first eight months to November stood at Rs4,58,000 crore ($67.46 billion) or 85.8 per cent of the budgeted target for the fiscal year ending next March, government data showed on Friday.

The fiscal deficit was 87 per cent of the full-year target during the same period a year ago.

Net tax receipts in the first eight months of 2016-17 fiscal year was Rs6,21,000 crore, the data showed.