Central Bank Economic Review Jan-Sept 2020: High Fiscal Cost of Covid 19

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Central Bank of Barbados Governor Cleviston Haynes delivers the Bank’s review of Barbados’ economic performance in the first nine months of 2020 and takes questions from the media and the live online audience.

Central Bank of Barbados
https://youtu.be/Zi_zVLJGAEU
Text version (PDF)

131 thoughts on “Central Bank Economic Review Jan-Sept 2020: High Fiscal Cost of Covid 19”


  1. Ultimately all the consultants can do is make recommendations on the state of the economy. With lockdowns now being reintroduced globally, forget tourist money for six months.

    They will have to ask the IMF for a two to three year ease, there will be little choice. An infrastructural program is probably the only way to keep things going locally.

    So may as well build homes for the poor, renew Bridgetown etc.

    Let Grenville be the project controller on the infrastructure works, at least he will stop people tiefing money. He can assess tenders, monitor construction works etc.

    Pay him the same as the fancy smancy economist is being paid. If he is willing.His input will be far more valuable at this stage, to ensure money is spent on quality and not carted away by the barrel.

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  2. @2
    I thought the projected shortfall was more like 222, vs 22.
    I tried options via a nephew who works on Wall St. Won on one, lost on another and a bunch expired. So back to day trading, what I do best. Ably assisted by stocks yielding 5%+ moves in a day. It is gambling.

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  3. No thanks!
    Govt keeping $7 million worth of shares in ICBL
    by SHAWN CUMBERBATCH shawncumberbatch@nationnews.com
    GOVERNMENT, through the National Insurance Board (NIB), is expected to keep its shares in the former state-owned Insurance Corporation of Barbados Limited (ICBL), declining a $7 million opportunity to sell.
    With ICBL’s majority owner Paynes Bay Finance Inc.’s (PBFI) extended takeover offer to minority shareholders scheduled to expire at 3 p.m. tomorrow, the DAILY NATION understands the NIB has signalled it will not be tendering its 9.91 per cent (3.9 million shares) stake in the insurer.
    PBFI, whose ultimate parent is JPK Capital Management Inc., owns 51.24 per cent (20.16 million shares) of ICBL through its wholly-owned subsidiary Hamilton Finance Limited, which it acquired from Bermuda’s BF& M Limited for $35.8 million in September.
    The NIB is the only entity outside of Hamilton Finance to own more than five per cent of ICBL, and if it turns down the offer to dispose of its shares for $1.78 each (US 89 cents), and other institutional or individual shareholders follow, this could stymie PBFI’s chance of acquiring 90 per cent of the company.
    Should the offeror receive shares tendered up to the equivalent of 90 per cent, it would be able to compulsorily buy the remainder.
    Avinash Persaud, who is chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC) and deputy chairman of the NIB, with responsibility for investment, stressed that the takeover offer was still open but confirmed the NIB would not be selling its ICBL shares.
    Persaud said management of the social security scheme concluded there was better value to be had by retaining the insurer’s stock, and that this was the recommendation to the board.
    “Any long-term investor who does not need to get out of their investment would hold on to the one that would have more long-term value than at the current price. A long-term shareholder like NIS would reasonably not accept the offer,” he said.
    Critical shareholders
    Some shareholders have criticised PBFI’s cash offer of $1.78 per share as being too low, considering that ICBL’s shares last traded at $3 each on the Barbados Stock Exchange on September 4.
    However, PBFI officials said the deal was equivalent to what they offered BF& M. Prior to selling, BF& M revealed that when its financial year ended on last December 31, ICBL had a book value of $49 million, so that the controlling interest it disposed of was “written down by $13.2 million to fair value as at December 31, 2019”.
    ICBL’s board of directors, in a recent circular to more than 2 100 institutional and individual minority shareholders, advised them to accept the takeover offer.
    Speaking in his capacity as FSC chairman, Persaud said the regulator had carefully examined BF& M’s sale to PBFI “to make sure it was an arm’s
    length relationship, that the buyout was fit and proper, and that they were going to maintain a healthy level of capital.
    “They have made all of those commitments. We then asked them to follow the takeover code which is to make an offer to everybody else. Everybody else doesn’t have to accept but they have the option,” he noted.
    Persaud also said the FSC had asked PBFI to extend its offer from the original expiration date of October 20 until tomorrow, November 3. This was because there were some concerns that while the offer to shareholders was dated September 18, 2020, the correspondence did not reach all shareholders at the same time.
    In the circular to shareholders, PBFI said: “The offeror and its parent have no immediate plans or proposals to effect any major changes in the business operations or management of ICBL. Further, there is no plan or proposal to liquidate, sell any of the assets, or to merge ICBL with any other company.
    “The offer is being made by the offeror to acquire all of the outstanding ICBL shares it does not already own. If the offeror is successful in acquiring all of the issued and outstanding ICBL shares it does not already own, the offeror intends to delist the ICBL shares from the Barbados Stock Exchange.”

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  4. @NO
    It is gambling.
    Never fully understood options and I avoid them.

    My computer is too slow for day trading.

    Just a buy and gold guy. Nothing fancy.

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  6. NO
    TheO

    It’s all gambling. Even if you invest in land
    Just one way is more secured than the other

    I wish you had done the trades by urself and not through your nephew. You lean from experiencing

    And for just starting out on options. IMO. Those were too many that u bought

    Seem to me like ur time factor was too short

    Try this one if you can

    NIO. Call option
    Expire dec. 2022
    Price. …… (. What ever the market price of the stock is today / when you buy it)

    TO

    You can buy and hold options also
    I started as a buy and hold and study/learn/ grew from there. Now a do some of all three
    Buy and hold for the dividend
    A lot of trading but not necessarily day trading
    Options buy and hold and trading

    I will have to find away to hook up with you guys to give you some tips

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  8. GDP should rise with the high levels elective surgeries to be done.

    If we could only get our young folks to care for their elderly parents and relatives.

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  9. NO & ThO

    Just an example of the difference

    When my stocks for NIO was up 100%

    My options for NIO was up over 1000%

    Ps…. NIO is blazing again in pre market. Up over 10%

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  10. Here is the minister of health on the nation’s preparations for the probable CoVid vaccine from Pfiger. It shows unpreparedness, incompetence and a man not on top of the crisis.
    The issue is: Have we placed any orders for vaccines? Yes or no? Why don’t we have a Czar to pull together all information and policies on CoVid? What is our epidemiological model? Why is there no CARICOM procurement plan?

    In an interview with the MIDWEEK NATION, Bostic said Government has already started exploring solutions to possible logistical hurdles in anticipation that the vaccine will soon be ready for mass distribution, as some scientific experts are predicting. For example, the minister explained that initial reports said the vaccine must be stored at a temperature of -70C (-94F), which is much lower than what the average home freezer can reach. …(Quote)

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  11. COVID 19 is in deed a real crisis as opposed to the eight year talk of a world wide recession (that ended in 2012) used by the DLP as an excuse to its poor performance.

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