LENDING BY THE IMF TO PROGRAMME COUNTRIES AND DENMARK'S COMMITMENTS TO THE IMF

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LENDING BY THE
IMF TO PROGRAMME
COUNTRIES AND
DENMARK’S
COMMITMENTS TO
THE IMF

Thomas Pihl Gade, Sune Malthe-Thagaard
and Louise Funch Sørensen, Economics

INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY                                   quotas. The decision has not yet been ratified
                                                           by a sufficient majority of member countries,
The International Monetary Fund, IMF, played               so several of them have chosen to contribute
and continues to play a key role in the manage-            temporary loans to ensure that the IMF has
ment of the global economic crisis. In recent              adequate capacity. Therefore, the fact that the
years, the IMF has granted crisis loans to sev-            2010 decision still remains to be implemented
eral countries and approved credit to poten-               has no major short-term impact on the IMF’s
tially vulnerable countries via its precautionary          total resources. On the contrary, it means that
facilities. The IMF extended particularly large            the IMF is dependent on temporary resources
loans to crisis-ridden euro area member states,            rather than permanent quota resources, which
which resulted in a high geographical concen-              causes considerable uncertainty as to the future
tration of lending. Ireland’s 3-year IMF loan pro-         resources.
gramme expired at the end of 2013 after robust                Denmark is among the countries that have
implementation of the required programme                   chosen to commit themselves to contributing
conditions, while Portugal will, according to the          temporary resources, including a bilateral loan.
plan, receive the last disbursement under its              The reason is that Denmark is very much affect-
IMF programme in June this year. Both coun-                ed by the development in the world economy
tries have announced that rather than receiving            and in the financial markets. Denmark sees a
subsequent precautionary programmes, they                  great strength in an international organisation
will rely on financing on market terms. Greece             such as the IMF that seeks to promote interna-
has also been in a position to issue government            tional economic and financial stability. Further-
bonds for the first time in four years.                    more, a loan from the IMF often paves the way
   To meet the demand for loans, the IMF                   for other regional or bilateral loans. Denmark’s
adapted its lending facilities and significantly           financial relations with the IMF are handled
expanded its lending capacity. The main objec-             by Danmarks Nationalbank. The temporary
tive of the lending facility reforms was to give           loan commitments have caused a substantial
the member countries easier access to large                increase in Danmarks Nationalbank’s poten-
loans, to increase the focus on precaution-                tial exposure to the IMF. Its actual exposure
ary loans and to streamline the conditionality             remains limited, however, as the IMF has only
attached to IMF programmes. The lending                    drawn on a small part of Denmark’s total loan
capacity was expanded through a number of                  commitment.
measures. In 2010, it was decided to double the               Loans to the IMF can be regarded as highly
IMF’s permanent resources consisting of the                secure, and, historically, the IMF member coun-
member countries’ financial contributions, or              tries have never suffered any losses by making

DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014                                                  41
quota resources or temporary loans available.
                                                                                    Total lending by the IMF since 2006                           Chart 1
One reason is that the IMF has preferred cred-
itor status, i.e. borrowing member countries                                        SDR billion
                                                                                    200
have to give priority to repayment to the IMF
over other creditors if they are unable to meet
                                                                                    150
their obligations. Moreover, the IMF requires
a number of strict conditions to be met by the                                      100
member countries before the money can be
                                                                                     50
disbursed. Finally, the IMF’s ongoing accumu-
lation of reserves contributes to safeguarding
                                                                                      0
member countries against any losses.                                                       2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014
                                                                                               Precautionary Facilities (FCL, PLL)
                                                                                               Extended Fund Facility (EFF)
                                                                                               Standard Borrowing Arrangement (SBA)

LENDING BY THE IMF
                                                                                    Note:       Stand-by arrangements, SBA, are the IMF’s ordinary loan
IN RECENT YEARS                                                                     facilities for high- and medium-income countries with short-term
                                                                                    balance of payments problems. An SBA typically has a maturity of
                                                                                    1-2 years and is subject to programme conditions. The Extended
                                                                                    Fund Facility, EFF, is generally equivalent to the SBA, but is intend-
                                                                                    ed for countries facing medium or long-term balance of payments
LARGE LOANS FROM THE IMF                                                            problems. The EFF is also subject to programme conditions, but
                                                                                    it typically has longer duration and repayment periods than the
DURING THE CRISIS
                                                                                    SBA. The Flexible Credit Line, FCL, and the Precautionary Liquidity
Providing loans to member countries with                                            Line, PLL, are precautionary loan facilities for member countries
                                                                                    that are generally pursuing sound economic policies.
balance of payments problems has always been                                        Source: IMF.
among the IMF’s core responsibilities. Such
loans can be provided either as precautionary
loans to prevent a crisis or as a direct crisis                                  as Greece, Ireland and Portugal. In 2013 and
management measure. All ordinary lending                                         most recently in May 2014, Cyprus and Ukraine,
by the IMF is financed by its other members,                                     respectively, also received substantial loans
including Denmark.                                                               from the IMF. The loans to those five countries
   While total lending1 to programme countries                                   belong under the IMF’s traditional loan facilities
was low during the years leading up to the cri-                                  (Stand-By Arrangements, SBA, and Extend-
sis, it increased strongly from the beginning of                                 ed Fund Facilities, EFF), which are subject to
the financial crisis in 2008 until today, from less                              a number of conditions that have to be met
than SDR 10 billion2 (just under kr. 70 billion)                                 before the loans can be disbursed. The purpose
in the pre-crisis years to approximately SDR                                     is to restore conditions for strong economic
150 billion (approximately kr. 1,200 billion) in                                 growth that will support the country’s ability
2014, cf. Chart 1.3 At the beginning of the crisis,                              to repay the loan. Today, the traditional loans
the increase was mainly attributable to large                                    account for almost 50 per cent of the IMF’s
loans to European programme countries such                                       total lending, cf. Chart 1. The remaining half is
                                                                                 provided as precautionary loans, i.e. a form of
1    The IMF distinguishes between loan commitments and actual lending.          overdraft facility, primarily to Mexico, Poland
     When a loan to a member country is approved by the IMF Executive            and Colombia.
     Board, this is in fact a credit line, or a loan commitment, for the total
     amount that the country can borrow in the course of the programme              At the same time, due to the large loans to
     period. Actual lending is provided gradually in the course of the pro-
     gramme period. This article uses the word lending about the IMF’s           Greece, Ireland and Portugal, the average size
     accumulated loan commitments.                                               of loans from the IMF has been substantially
2    The Special Drawing Right, SDR, is the IMF’s unit of account. The SDR       larger than before in both absolute terms and
     is a basket of currencies, currently consisting of US dollars, euro, yen
     and pound sterling. This article uses an exchange rate for SDR vis-à-       relative to the countries’ membership contri-
     vis the krone of 841.40, equivalent to the rate as per 13 May 2014.
                                                                                 butions, or quotas, to the IMF. Moreover, as a
3    The article only considers lending by the IMF to high- and medium-in-
     come countries. In addition, the IMF has granted loans under the            result of the loans, lending by the IMF is now
     Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) – primarily to developing         geographically concentrated to a far greater
     countries. Today, these loans only account for 2 per cent of the IMF’s
     total lending.                                                              extent than before. More than half of the IMF’s

42                                                                               DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014
Total lending by the IMF broken down by geographical area, end-March, 2014 (left), and                                                     Chart 2
  geographical distribution of IMF lending, exclusive of precautionary lending facilities (right)

                 4 per cent                                                                            8 per cent
                                                                                          1 per cent
                                                                                       2 per cent

   35 per cent

                                                           57 per cent

                                                                                                                                    89 per cent
                 4 per cent

      Europe        Africa    North and South America            Asia              Europe           Africa    North and South America        Asia

  Source: IMF.

current loan commitments are made to Europe-                                 in the financial markets, cf. Marcussen and
an countries, cf. Chart 2 (left). Excluding lend-                            Sørensen (2012). Many programme countries
ing under the precautionary loan facilities, the                             pursued unsustainable fiscal policies, experi-
share of lending by the IMF to European coun-                                enced macroeconomic imbalances and failed
tries is almost 90 per cent, cf. Chart 2 (right).                            to implement structural reforms during the
                                                                             boom preceding the crisis. The substantial loan
RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN SELECTED                                              arrangements from the IMF and the EU should
EUROPEAN PROGRAMME COUNTRIES                                                 be viewed against the backdrop of the risk of
A number of European countries have received                                 contagion effects on the government bond
IMF programmes since the beginning of the                                    market between a number of countries where
crisis in 2008, cf. Table 1. The programmes were                             considerable parts of the excess yield spread
granted partly because the countries were                                    could not be explained by economic fundamen-
no longer able to cover their financing needs                                tals, cf. Abildgren and Malthe-Thagaard (2012).

  Loan programmes from the IMF and the EU to selected European programme countries                                                           Table 1

                                                                                                                                     Total loan in
  Billion euro         Programme initiated Programme expired              IMF loan EU loan Total loan package                     per cent of GDP

  Iceland              November 2008           August 2011                         2            -                     2                           16

  Greece I             May 2010                (May 2013)                        20           53                    73   1
                                                                                                                                                  33

  Ireland              December 2010            December 2013                    23           45                     68                           43

  Portugal             May 2011                June 2014                         26           52                     78                           46

  Greece II            March 2012              March 2016                        28          145                    173                           89

  Cyprus               April 2013              April 2016                          1            9                   10                            61

  Ukraine   2
                       April 2014               April 2016                       12             -                        -                          7

  Source: IMF, Eurostat and the European Commission.
  1. The total loan package amounted to 110 billion euro, the IMF and the euro area member states contributing 30 and 80 billion euro, re-

     spectively. The first loan package to Greece was replaced by a new loan package before all disbursements had been made. The remaining
     disbursements were transferred to the new loan programme as from March 2012.
  2. In addition to the loan from the IMF, Ukraine is expected to receive bilateral loans and assistance from a number of countries and internation-

     al organisations, including the EU, the USA, the World Bank and others, totalling minimum 7 billion euro under the loan programme.

DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014                                                                                                43
Hence, it was crucial to stabilise the crisis-rid-    costs (primary balance) of 0.8 per cent of GDP,4
den countries to ensure international economic        thereby fulfilling the fiscal policy programme
stability.                                            requirement for 2013. The aim is to achieve a
    Ireland chose not to apply to the IMF or its      surplus of 3 per cent of GDP on the primary bal-
European partners for a precautionary pro-            ance in 2015. Moreover, the improvement in the
gramme on expiry of its programme in Decem-           balance of payments has been a positive sur-
ber 2013. Instead, Ireland relied on the central      prise, also showing a small surplus in 2013. As
government’s renewed market access. Ireland           a result of favourable economic developments,
implemented the programme in a highly sat-            the Greek government issued a 5-year govern-
isfactory manner that included reforms of its         ment bond in the financial markets for the first
financial sector and substantial fiscal consol-       time since the beginning of the crisis. The yield
idation, cf. IMF (2013). The country’s growth         was 4.95 per cent, which is lower than the level
was lower than assumed when the programme             immediately before the crisis. The government
was initiated, but higher than in the euro area.      is still behind on the implementation of labour
But there are still major challenges: The gov-        market reforms, and it is uncertain whether the
ernment deficit is large and public debt is very      banks need further recapitalisation, e.g. due
high.                                                 to a high number of non-performing loans. In
    Portugal’s programme is on track accord-          addition, Greece’s sovereign debt is very high,
ing to the most recent review, and economic           and it will take many years of focused fiscal
activity and employment have developed more           policy to reduce the debt.
favourably than assumed, cf. IMF (2014). In               Cyprus exceeded expectations during the
February, Portugal once again issued 10-year          first year of the programme in terms of im-
government bonds and has now obtained                 plementing the programme requirements, of
financing until the autumn of 2015. The coun-         which the public deficit target was met by a
try faces a number of challenges, however; for        considerable margin. At the same time, the fall
example, labour market flexibility remains low,       in growth was smaller than feared. But Cyprus
and there is uncertainty about the consequenc-        still faces challenges with an increasing number
es of the outcome of some Constitutional Court        of non-performing loans, declining extension of
rulings on 2014 budget measures. Neverthe-            credit and rising unemployment.
less, Portugal’s IMF programme will expire in             Ukraine obtained a loan programme from the
June this year. The country chose not to apply        IMF on 30 April 2014. The country has been in
for a precautionary facility from the European        a recession since mid-2012 and is thus experi-
Stability Mechanism, ESM, or the IMF.                 encing its second major crisis in just six years.
    Greece is now on its second loan programme        The exchange rate was overvalued as a result of
since its sovereign debt crisis. This is attrib-      ongoing interventions by the National Bank of
utable to the country’s deep structural prob-         Ukraine. Despite large government deficits, the
lems and the sustained crisis, cf. Mikkelsen          government raised the civil service wage bill
and Sørensen (2012). Greece failed to meet a          considerably in 2013, increased pensions sub-
number of programme conditions during the             stantially, and maintained the lowest gas prices
first three years: The country did not sufficiently   in Europe via public subsidies of approximately
implement the structural reforms and privati-         7.5 pct. of GDP in 2012, when gas import prices
sation of public enterprises agreed with the          were going up. The economic crisis culminated
troika, i.e. the IMF, the ECB and the European        in February 2014, when the central bank could
Commission. Furthermore, development in
the government deficit and debt was weaker
                                                      4   According to Eurostat’s press release, Greece had a primary balance
than assumed in the programme. In the course              deficit of 8.7 per cent of GDP in 2013, mainly as a result of large one-
                                                          off expenses to recapitalise the Greek banking sector. The Europe-
of 2013, the tide turned, and for the first time          an Commission, the ECB and the IMF have calculated the primary
in 10 years, Greece recorded a small surplus              surplus of 0.8 per cent of GDP in 2013 based on the definition in
                                                          Greece’s loan programme, cf. press briefing from the Commission of
on the government budget excluding interest               23 April 2014.

44                                                    DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014
no longer defend the exchange rate due to a                Finally, the IMF has made a number of modifica-
very low foreign exchange reserve covering                 tions to the programme conditionality associ-
only two months’ imports, according to the IMF.            ated with a traditional loan programme in an
                                                           effort to make it more streamlined and focused
                                                           on the IMF’s core areas of responsibility, cf.
REFORMS OF IMF LENDING                                     IMF 2012. Generally, the design should seek to
FACILITIES                                                 ensure fulfilment of a number of principles: 1.
                                                           national ownership of the reform programme,
In the course of the crisis, the IMF implement-            2. parsimony in programme-related conditions,
ed a number of changes in its lending facilities           3. tailoring to country circumstances, 4. effec-
to strengthen its capacity to both prevent and             tive coordination with other multilateral insti-
alleviate crises. The reforms focused especially           tutions such as the World Bank and the OECD,
on giving access to extraordinarily large loans,           and 5. clarity in the specification of conditions.
increased the focus on precautionary lending               The objective is to ensure that the necessary
and allowed more streamlining of programme                 reforms are implemented and thus to enable
conditionality.                                            the country to repay the loan.
    A frequently used method of measuring the                 Loan programmes from the IMF are subject
size of a member country’s loan from the IMF               to regular reviews to enable the IMF to assess
is to scale it relative to the country’s IMF quota.        agreed reform progress and consider any nec-
Normal access to an IMF loan is based on a fixed           essary adjustments. Hence, most of the current
percentage of the country’s quota and varies               disbursements are conditional upon the bor-
with the loan facility. In 2009, access to the IMF’s       rower complying with the agreed programme
Stand-By Arrangements, SBA, was doubled from               conditions. Overall, the conditions can be
300 to 600 per cent of the quota. At the same              broken down into three types, cf. Box 1: prior
time, it became easier for member countries                actions, quantitative performance criteria and
to get access to extraordinarily large loans of            structural benchmarks. In addition, indicative
over 600 per cent of the quota. Such loans are             targets can be used to supplement the quanti-
approved when a member country is facing an                tative performance criteria for the IMF to assess
exceptional situation that threatens its financial         compliance with the programme.
stability, and where immediate action is crucial.
Greece, Ireland and Portugal all obtained in-              PROGRAMME CONDITIONS FOR EUROPEAN
creased loans on that background of 3,200 per              LOANS FROM THE IMF
cent of the quota for Greece and 2,300 per cent            The conditionality framework of a programme
of the quotas for Ireland and Portugal.                    is tailored to individual member countries’
    Since 2009, the IMF focused increasingly               structures and the nature of the crisis. The Eu-
on preventing crises, e.g. by introducing new              ropean programme countries all had large gov-
precautionary loan facilities. The Flexible Credit         ernment budget deficits. As a result, they were
Line, FCL, is based solely on qualification re-            no longer able to issue government bonds in
quirements with the aim of signalling that the             the financial markets due to unsustainably large
country has strong economic fundamentals and               public debt. Consequently, the programmes of
is pursuing a sound economic policy, but only              all countries contained a requirement for fiscal
needs an overdraft facility as a buffer against            consolidation in the form of quantitative per-
future external shocks. Hence, the FCL facility            formance criteria, including targets for improv-
is not subject to the IMF’s usual programme                ing the government budget balance and a cap
conditions. The Precautionary Liquidity Line,              on public debt.
PLL, aimed at countries with sound economic                   The variations between programme coun-
fundamentals, is also based on qualification               tries are attributable to different drivers of their
requirements, but, in addition, includes certain           debt problems. Broadly speaking, the countries
programme conditions.                                      can be divided into two groups: Ireland and

DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014                                                     45
Types of programme conditions for IMF                  Box 1      Total number of prior actions and struc-                     Chart 3
     loan programmes                                                   tural benchmarks

     Prior actions: Actions to be taken before the IMF Exec-
                                                                       Antal
     utive Board approves a programme or a programme
                                                                       50
     review. They must ensure that the programme has the
     necessary foundation to succeed or is put back on track           40
     following deviations from agreed policies. The purpose is
     twofold: to ensure member countries a minimum of pro-             30
     gramme ownership, and to implement the programme
     conditions by specifying certain measures before the              20
     programme is approved.
                                                                       10
     Quantitative performance criteria: Targets that must be
     met to complete a programme review. They always relate             0
     to macroeconomic variables under the control of the                      ISL (2008) GR (2010) IE (2010) PT (2011) GR (2012)
     authorities, such as monetary and credit aggregates,                   Forudgående initiativer      Strukturelle referencepunkter
     international reserves, fiscal balances, and external
     borrowing.
                                                                       Note:     The parenthesis indicates the year the programme was
                                                                       initiated. IS = Iceland, GR = Greece, IE = Ireland, PT = Portugal.
     Structural benchmarks: These are (often non-quantifiable)         Note that the number of programme conditions is to date and
     reform measures that are critical to achieve programme            hence may increase over the programme period.
                                                                       Source: Monitoring of Fund Arrangements (imf.org).
     goals. They are intended as markers to assess pro-
     gramme implementation during a review. They vary
     across programmes: examples are measures to improve
     financial sector operations, build up social safety nets, or   conditions, the European Commission covered
     strengthen public financial management.
                                                                    the more extensive structural reforms. The ECB
     Indicative targets: They supplement quantitative perfor-       focused on financial stability and transmission
     mance criteria for assessing programme progress. Some-
                                                                    of monetary policy in the euro area. As regards
     times they also replace quantitative performance criteria
     when there is data uncertainty about economic trends.          structural conditionality, the Commission’s
     As uncertainty is reduced, these targets are turned into       measures were often more detailed than those
     quantitative performance criteria, with appropriate
                                                                    launched by the IMF.
     modifications.
                                                                       The number of structural benchmarks and
     Source: IMF.                                                   prior actions under the programmes has
                                                                    increased in the course of the crisis, cf. Chart
                                                                    3. However, the number alone does not nec-
Cyprus ended up becoming liable for problems                        essarily provide an exhaustive description of
in their financial sectors with balances of up to                   the scope of a programme, as some political
approximately 800 per cent of GDP. In the case                      measures can be more demanding and broader
of Ireland, this reflected a considerable house                     in scope to implement than others. In addi-
price bubble. In Greece and Portugal, the econ-                     tion, the programmes have different durations,
omies suffered from substantial structural prob-                    reflecting the depth of the countries’ economic
lems, a high level of debt, large external imbal-                   challenges.
ances and poor competitiveness. Furthermore,                           There may be several reasons why the IMF
Portugal and particularly Greece had large                          laid down more programme conditions at a lat-
government deficits. The number and type of                         er stage of the crisis. Iceland’s programme was
programme conditions also varied in several                         characterised by being directly associated with
areas. The former countries were requested es-                      the financial crisis after the banking sector’s
pecially to reform their financial sectors, while                   collapse in 2008. Although fiscal policy had
extensive structural reforms were needed in the                     also been much too expansionary, the coun-
latter countries.                                                   try’s economic structures were basically sound.
   IMF (2012) evaluates the programmes for                          Political measures were therefore restricted to
the crisis-ridden euro area member states in                        the financial sector and fiscal tightening due to
view of the troika cooperation. While the IMF                       the large drain on the government budget as
focused particularly on short-term macrocritical                    a result of bank restructuring. The later pro-

46                                                                  DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014
IMF resources and lending capacity                  Box 2     IMF resources during the crisis                           Chart 4

  The IMF’s resources are made up of permanent resources
                                                                SDR billion
  in the form of member country quota payments, and of          1000
  borrowed resources in the form of the multilateral bor-
  rowing agreements, New Arrangements to Borrow, NAB,            800
  and bilateral loan agreements.
                                                                 600
       The size and distribution of IMF quotas are deter-
  mined by the IMF Board of Governors in periodical re-          400
  source reviews. When member countries get loans from
                                                                 200
  the IMF, the Fund may draw on the quotas for member
  countries which, in the Fund’s assessment, have substan-         0
  tial resources. The IMF publishes a quarterly compilation             2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
  of those countries.                                                       Bilateral loans
                                                                            New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB)
       Furthermore, the IMF has access to temporary loans                   Quotas
  from 38 member countries, including Denmark, under the                    IMF Forward Commitment Capacity (FCC)
  multilateral NAB loan agreements. The NAB is a second-
  ary source of finance established in 1997 to supplement
  quota resources during the Asian crisis. The NAB loan         Note:    Data for 2015 assumes the implementation of the 2010
                                                                reform in the course of 2015 and estimation of lending capacity.
  facility was expanded substantially as a result of the
                                                                Lending capacity for 2014 and 2015 takes into account the loan to
  global economic crisis. At the same time it was decided       Ukraine of SDR 11 billion (kr. 90 billion) that was approved on 30
  that the NAB should be activated for periods of no more       April 2014.
  than 6 months at a time, thus requiring 85 per cent of        Source: IMF and own calculations.
  NAB participants (measured by loan size) to approve the
  activation.
       In 2012, a number of countries concluded temporary
  bilateral borrowing agreements with the IMF. Drawings
  on the agreements are only permitted when the IMF’s         multilateral New Arrangements to Borrow, NAB,
  lending capacity in the form of quota resources and         and a number of bilateral borrowing agree-
  NAB falls below SDR 100 billion. Besides, they can only
                                                              ments, cf. Box 2. The quota resources are part
  be used when the NAB is also activated. The bilateral
  loan commitments amount to SDR 273 billion (kr. 2,300       of the IMF’s permanent resources and should,
  billion).                                                   under normal circumstances, be its primary
       The IMF’s lending capacity is not the same as the
                                                              source of financing, while a number of member
  total available resources, as the IMF draws only on those
  member countries which, in the Fund’s assessment, have      countries, including Denmark, have temporarily
  substantial financial resources. The most common indica-    made NAB and bilateral loans available.
  tor of capacity is the Forward Commitment Capacity, FCC,
  which is a measure of the usable resources available for
                                                                 As the need for loans rose during the course
  the next 12 months. The FCC consists of undrawn quotas      of the crisis, the IMF has had its resources
  and NAB resources plus the estimated repayments on          increased. Since 2008, its total resources in-
  existing loans over the coming 12 months. At end-March,
  the IMF’s FCC amounted to SDR 272 billion. Add to this      creased from approximately SDR 251 billion to
  the value of the bilateral loan agreements.                 approximately SDR 880 billion (approximately
                                                              kr. 7,400 billion) in 2014, cf. Chart 4.
                                                                 The background for the increase is four ma-
grammes were introduced in connection with                    jor agreements concluded between the mem-
the sovereign debt crisis in southern Europe                  ber countries since 2009:
and were attributable to problems of a more                      In 2009, governments and central banks
structural nature, including poor competitive-                decided to contribute temporary bilateral
ness, inefficient public sectors and inflexible               loans to the IMF totalling approximately SDR
labour markets.                                               180 billion. These loans were intended to exist
                                                              only as long as they were needed, or until
                                                              other long-term financing for the IMF was in
IMF RESOURCES DURING THE CRISIS                               place. At the same time it was agreed that
                                                              the resources from the bilateral loan agree-
Growth in lending by the IMF required a sub-                  ments should be transferred to an expanded
stantial increase in its resources. Lending by                version of the existing NAB arrangement at a
the IMF is financed by quotas supplemented                    later stage. By increasing the NAB loans it was
by temporary credit arrangements such as the                  ensured that the IMF would have access to

DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014                                                                             47
IMF resources broken down by countries and groups of countries                                                                             Table 2

     SDR billion                                         Quotas           NAB      Bilateral loans              Total       Total in per cent of GDP

     Total                                                   198          365                   305              868                                2.1

     EU1                                                      59            98                  149              306                                3.5

     USA                                                      42            69                     -             111                                1.0

     Japan                                                    16            66                   40                21                               3.8

     Emerging economies                                       51            80                   82              212                                1.5

     Others                                                   30            52                   34              118                                2.1

     Reference values

     Denmark                                                  1.9          3.2                  4.6               9.7                               4.5

     Nordic-Baltic constituency2                              7.5         13.7                 20.7             42.0                                3.8

     Note:    Only countries drawn on by the IMF, i.e. countries included in the IMF’s Financial Transaction Plan, are included. Since the IMF does not
     draw on programme countries, not all EU member states are included in the table.
     1. Excluding EU member states with IMF programmes.

     2. The Nordic-Baltic constituency of the IMF consists of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden.

     Source: IMF and own calculations.

financing in the slightly longer term, as NAB                                    resources from the member countries which,
loans, contrary to bilateral loans, need to be                                   in the Fund’s assessment, have a sufficiently
activated every six months, but do not have an                                   strong balance of payments and currency posi-
actual maturity date.                                                            tion. The IMF seeks to spread the financing bur-
   In 2010, the group of countries participating                                 den among those countries. Every quarter, the
in the NAB was expanded, and the existing bi-                                    IMF prepares a financing plan for the coming
lateral loans were transferred to the NAB loans,                                 quarter, establishing the distribution between
causing the NAB loan facility to increase from                                   quota financing and other financing. The Fund
SDR 34 billion to SDR 370 billion in 2011.                                       also prepares a transaction plan specifying the
   In 2010, the IMF member countries also                                        distribution of drawings on the countries par-
agreed to reform the quotas, doubling the                                        ticipating in the financing plan.
IMF’s quota resources to approximately SDR                                          Most of the IMF’s resources are made availa-
480 billion, cf. Bohn-Jespersen (2010). The deci-                                ble by advanced economies, cf. Table 2. Den-
sion remains to be implemented, however, as it                                   mark and the other Nordic and Baltic member
requires ratification by a majority of the mem-                                  countries with which Denmark shares a seat
ber countries’ national parliaments. At the same                                 on the IMF Executive Board finance a relatively
time, the expanded NAB has to be transferred                                     substantial part. Denmark’s contribution thus
to quotas, thereby making resources perma-                                       amounts to 4.5 per cent of GDP. By comparison,
nent rather than temporary.                                                      the Fund’s total resources constitute 2.1 per
   As a result of the delayed implementation                                     cent of global GDP. This overweighting reflects
of the quota reform and increased demand for                                     the fact that the Nordic countries are major
loans from the IMF during the crisis, a number                                   contributors of NAB resources and bilateral
of countries made new temporary bilateral                                        loans. Add to this that a country’s quota share
loans available to the IMF in 2012. They are                                     is not calculated solely on the basis of GDP, but
only to be used if the need for loans exceeds                                    is also based on a number of variables, includ-
the IMF’s quota resources and NAB.                                               ing trade flows and financial openness, which
   In practice, the IMF provides loans to pro-                                   provide a more accurate picture of the coun-
gramme countries by similarly drawing on                                         try’s relative position in the world economy.

48                                                                               DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014
UNCERTAINTY ABOUT THE IMF’S                                                   es will then begin to decline, unless the bilater-
FUTURE RESOURCES                                                              al loans are extended.
The future size and composition of the IMF’s
resources are currently subject to some uncer-
tainty. Several countries have not yet approved                               DENMARK’S FINANCIAL
the decision of 2010 to double quota resources                                CONTRIBUTION TO THE IMF
to SDR 480 billion. Denmark has approved the
decision as we support a substantial increase
in the permanent share of the IMF’s resources.                                DENMARK CONTRIBUTES CONSIDERABLY TO
As the only major country, the US Congress                                    THE IMF’S RESOURCES
has not yet approved the decision. This means                                 As a member of the IMF, Denmark contributes
that the doubling has not entered into force                                  financing of loans to member countries with
four years after the decision was made. In the                                balance of payments problems. Denmark sees a
short term, this has no significant impact on the                             great strength in an international organisation
volume of the total resources, but it means that                              such as the IMF that seeks to promote inter-
the IMF is dependent on temporary resources,                                  national economic and financial stability. The
i.e. NAB and bilateral loans, rather than perma-                              IMF is the only global institution that has the
nent quota resources.                                                         resources and competencies to provide loans
   But the NAB resources are also subject to                                  in connection with crises or as precautionary
some uncertainty, as they need to be reacti-                                  loans. Therefore, it is imperative that the IMF’s
vated every six months for the IMF to be able                                 continued role in performing this important
to draw on them. The BRIC countries in par-                                   function is not called into question. This is
ticular are dissatisfied that the USA remains                                 part of the reason why Denmark has chosen
to approve the reform. Their dissatisfaction                                  to contribute additional resources to the IMF.
reflects the fact that the decision to double                                 Moreover, the crisis turned out to be of exten-
resources is linked to a shift in the distribution                            sive scope, and Denmark wish to ensure that
of the seats on the IMF Executive Board, in-                                  the IMF has ample resources in order to con-
cluding two seats less for developed European                                 tribute to boosting confidence in the financial
countries, primarily in favour of the emerging                                markets. Furthermore, loans from the IMF often
economies5. The BRIC countries’ willingness to                                pave the way for other regional or bilateral
keep reactivating the NAB has therefore been                                  loans. Besides, the crisis turned out to hit Eu-
questioned.6                                                                  rope particularly hard. The European economy
   The first bilateral loan agreements were                                   is extremely important to Denmark, which was
signed in the autumn of 2012. They run for a                                  another reason for supporting the IMF with
period of two years, but may be extended for                                  additional financing in coordination with the
another two times one year if necessitated by                                 other EU member states.
the Fund’s resource situation and the scope                                      As one of few member countries, Denmark
of the crisis. In principle, this means that the                              has never relied on loans from the IMF. As
agreements may begin expiring as from Octo-                                   mentioned above, Denmark contributes via its
ber this year, and that the Fund’s total resourc-                             membership commitment, the quota, and via
                                                                              the various temporary credit arrangements, cf.
                                                                              Chart 5.
5   The members of the IMF Executive Board are elected in the constit-
    uencies. With the introduction of the governance and quota reform            Denmark’s financial relations with the IMF
    of 2010, the entire Executive Board will be up for election. As part of   are handled by Danmarks Nationalbank on
    the reform the member countries agreed that the number of seats on
    the Executive Board for developed European countries should be re-        behalf of the Danish government. Hence, Dan-
    duced, primarily in favour of growth economies. This means that the
    European constituencies will either consolidate further or give more      marks Nationalbank pays Denmark’s quota and
    time on the Executive Board to growth economies in their current          contributes temporary financing.
    constituencies.
                                                                                 Danmarks Nationalbank’s total loan commit-
6   The BRIC countries have sufficient voting power among the NAB par-
    ticipants to have the right to veto the approval of the NAB activation.   ment to the IMF was kr. 14 billion before the

DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014                                                                       49
of other member countries, Danmarks Nation-
     Denmark’s contribution to IMF resources                       Chart 5
                                                                               albank must be consulted as to whether the
     broken down by quota subscriptions
     and loan commitments to NAB and                                           bilateral loan should be extended by another
     bilateral loans                                                           year. If the bilateral loan is not extended, Dan-
                                                                               marks Nationalbank’s total commitment to the
     Kr. billion
     90                                                                        IMF will be halved.
     80                                                                           Unlike drawings on the loan commitments,
     70
     60
                                                                               Danmarks Nationalbank’s commitments to the
     50                                                                        IMF are not - in themselves - included in the for-
     40
                                                                               eign exchange reserve, cf. Jensen and Sørensen
     30
     20                                                                        (2009). The reason is that the IMF’s drawings
     10                                                                        on Danmarks Nationalbank’s commitments can,
      0
                End 2006            End 2013            After quota            under certain circumstances, be redeemed by
                                                          reform
                                                                               Danmarks Nationalbank before maturity. Ac-
               Quotas             NAB             Bilateral loan
                                                                               cording to the IMF’s statistical standards, such
                                                                               drawings are liquid and may thus be included
     Source: Danmarks Nationalbank.                                            in the foreign exchange reserve. In practice,
                                                                               the IMF draws on Danmarks Nationalbank’s
                                                                               loan commitments by applying to Danmarks
crisis. At end-2013, the commitments had risen                                 Nationalbank for resources as foreign exchange
to kr. 82 billion.7 This reflects Danmarks Nation-                             from the foreign exchange reserve. In return
albank’s temporary loan commitments in the                                     for this, Danmarks Nationalbank gets a claim
form of NAB and bilateral loans. Denmark has                                   on the IMF, which is also included in the foreign
been a party to the NAB agreement since 1997,                                  exchange reserve. Thus, rather than changing
but raised its loan commitment from kr. 2 bil-                                 the volume of the reserve, the IMF’s drawings
lion to kr. 28 billion in 2011. In 2012, Danmarks                              on Danmarks Nationalbank will only change
Nationalbank signed a borrowing agreement                                      its composition. Most of the IMF’s lending is
under which Denmark contributes a bilateral                                    disbursed in predetermined tranches, and
commitment of kr. 40 billion.8 Of the total loan                               not until the Fund deems that the measures
commitment of kr. 82 billion, just under kr. 8                                 adopted by the IMF Executive Board have been
billion had been drawn at end-2013, meaning                                    implemented. Hence, Danmarks Nationalbank
that only a very limited part of the commitment                                is typically well acquainted with the IMF’s future
to IMF had been utilised.                                                      drawings on Danmarks Nationalbank.
   The composition of Danmarks National-
bank’s total loan commitment will be changed                                   LARGE POTENTIAL CREDIT EXPOSURE, BUT EX-
considerably when the quota reform of 2010                                     TREMELY LOW RISK ON LOANS TO THE IMF
enters into force, cf. Chart 5. The reform entails                             The initiatives to boost the IMF’s resources
a rise in Denmark’s quota from kr. 16 billion to                               during the crisis increased Danmarks National-
kr. 28 billion. However, the rise will be offset by                            bank’s potential exposure to the IMF from kr. 14
an equivalent reduction in Danmarks National-                                  billion to kr. 82 billion. As such exposure is to
bank’s NAB commitment. The bilateral loan will                                 the IMF and not to the countries to which the
mature in the autumn of 2014, so, like a number                                loans are granted, it is considerable.
                                                                                   Several factors imply that loans to the IMF
                                                                               can be deemed to be very safe. First of all,
7    Only commitments to the IMF’s General Resource Account covering
     the Fund’s ordinary lending are considered below. Add to this com-        the IMF is given priority over other creditors
     mitments such as Denmark’s participation in the IMF’s SDR system of
     approximately kr. 26 billion and lending to low income countries via      when loans are to be repaid – also known as
     the IMF’s Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust, PRGT, of kr. 1.6 billion.   preferred creditor status. This status is indicat-
8    The first bilateral loan commitment of approximately kr. 15 billion was   ed by the following factors: 1. the borrowing
     made in 2009 and added to Danmarks Nationalbank’s NAB commit-
     ment in 2011.                                                             countries are willing to give priority to repay-

50                                                                             DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014
ment to the IMF over other creditors if they are                        Bohn-Jespersen, Helene Kronholm (2010),
unable to meet their obligations, and 2. other                          The IMF’s quota and governance reform 2010,
creditors accept this situation. Although the                           Danmarks Nationalbank, Monetary Review, 4th
IMF’s status does not involve legally binding                           Quarter.
agreements with debtors and other creditors,
it is confirmed by the Paris Club.9 Moreover, the                       IMF (2012), 2011 Review of Conditionality –
IMF builds up reserves to be used in case of                            Overview Paper.
income losses and also has a substantial gold
stock. The interest margin that the IMF earns by                        IMF (2013), Ireland Twelfth Review, Country
providing loans finances its activities and is also                     Report No. 13/366, December 2013.
used to build up reserves against any losses.
    It is crucial for all creditors to have good                        IMF (2014), Portugal Eleventh Review, Country
insight into the situation of the specific borrow-                      Report No. 14/102, April 2014.
ing country. The IMF gains particular insight
into the economies of its member countries                              Jensen, Thomas Krabbe and Søren Vester
through its ongoing surveillance of macroe-                             Sørensen (2009), Danmarks Nationalbank’s
conomic and financial conditions. Every year,                           financial accounts with the International Mone-
the IMF monitors the economies of its member                            tary Fund, IMF, Danmarks Nationalbank, Mone-
countries via Article IV consultations. In addi-                        tary Review, 4th Quarter.
tion, an in-depth analysis of the financial sec-
tors of its member countries, the Financial Sec-                        Marcussen, Anne Brolev and Louise Funch
tor Assessment Programme, FSAP, is performed                            Sørensen (2012), The process towards an EU/
every five years for 29 member countries with                           IMF loan programme and a debt restructuring,
systemically important financial sectors, includ-                       Danmarks Nationalbank, Monetary Review, 4th
ing Denmark.                                                            Quarter, Part 1.
    Finally, most lending by the IMF is provided
under IMF programmes that include conditions                            Mikkelsen, Uffe and Søren Vester Sørensen
on the implementation of economic reforms.                              (2012), Write-down of Greek debt and new EU/
The requirements contribute to reducing the                             IMF loan programme, Danmarks Nationalbank,
risk associated with the loans, e.g. by address-                        Monetary Review, 1st Quarter, Part 1.
ing moral hazard problems. Indeed, the pur-
pose of the conditions is to create an incentive
for the countries to handle the problems that
led to the application for a loan. The conditions
are also designed to ensure that the loans are
repaid.

LITERATURE

Abildgren, Kim and Sune Malthe-Thagaard
(2012), A comparison of the ERM crisis in the
early 1990s with recent years’ financial and sov-
ereign debt crisis in Europe, Danmarks Nation-
albank, Monetary Review, 4th Quarter, Part 1.

9   The Paris Club is the forum in which bilateral creditors conclude
    agreements on debt restructuring for debtor countries that are
    unable to pay their debt commitments.

DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014                                                                51
52   DANMARKS NATIONALBANK MONETARY REVIEW, 2ND QUARTER, 2014
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