By Cooper Inveen
ACCRA (Reuters) – Ghana has extended the registration deadline for its domestic debt exchange programme to Dec. 30, with an expected settlement date of Jan. 6, the finance ministry said in a statement overnight on Friday.
The ministry had previously set a deadline of Dec. 19 for domestic bondholders to apply for the debt exchange, with new domestic bonds to be issued on Dec. 23.
Under the domestic debt exchange, local bonds will be exchanged for new ones maturing in 2027, 2029, 2032 and 2037, and their annual coupon will be set at 0% in 2023, 5% in 2024 and 10% from 2025 until maturity.
Ghana, once considered a rising star among emerging market economies, is today facing a generational debt crisis. Inflation was above 50% in November, and the central bank has hiked its main lending rate by 12.5 percentage points this year.
On Tuesday, Ghana and the International Monetary Fund announced a staff-level agreement for a $3 billion relief program, which Reuters first reported late last week.
(Reporting by Cooper Inveen; Editing by Leslie Adler)
