The Greek state’s pace in covering arrears to the private sector slacked off considerably last month, the Bank of Greece (BoG) reported this week, as only 14 million euros was recorded as going towards that purpose in October.
Nevertheless, the development was considered as more-or-less predictable, given that a large chunk of arrears were covered in the previous month, September 2017, in tandem with tax rebates reaching 1.5 billion euros.
The “push” to cover arrears in September aimed at meeting a memorandum target, and thereby allowing the Greek state to receive an 800-million-euro tranche of bailout money from the ESM as part of the ongoing third memorandum bailout.
In a far cry from October’s performance, the previous month witnessed 482 million euros in arrears by the state to the private sector covered – a monthly record for 2017.
Moreover, between July and October 2017, 897 million euros were allocated to cover arrears, out of the total of 1.696 billion euros until the end of September.
