Super Bond fire sale; fifty percent drop sends Belize to ‘junk’ status

And in financial news, there is information to News Five that as much as sixty million dollars of Belize Bonds traded on Tuesday at a fire sale price of thirty-four cents to the dollar. From what we have learnt a private Swiss Bank bought the bonds but the seller is not confirmed at this time. This represents a dramatic fall in the value of the bonds over the past month of close to fifty percent during the same period when the Caribbean Court of Justice ordered the government to pay ninety million dollars in a pending debt. And as we have reported, at least nine Ministers publicly said that they do not support paying the debt owed by the Government.  Now, the drop in value of the Belize bonds means it has now reached junk bond status.  This signals a serious loss of confidence and suggests major concerns by bondholders that the government will default on the bonds.  Any such default will most certainly have serious repercussions on an already stagnant and vulnerable economy.