Jeffrey Franks (FMI): The agreement with Romania will continue, even if inflation target was missed

The foreign finance agreement will be carried out, even if the inflation target went slightly over the target fixed last year, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief of mission to Romania Jeffrey Franks declared, quoted by Romanian press agency NewsIn. „We have reasons to believe that the programme will continue. The inflation target was missed by a very narrow margin. If we look at the IMF intention letter, there’s a 1% strip around the inflation target”, Franks said after finalising discussions with the Romanian National Bank (BNR) representatives.

Last year, BNR fixed an inflation target of 3.5%, plus/minus one percentage, but the target was missed for the third year in row. The consumption prices index went up in December to 4.74%.

According to Franks, the programme planned by the Romanian authorities with the IMF „is very ambitious and aggressive”, bearing in mind that the IMF’s main goal is to help countries get a macroeconomic stability for economic growth.

Asked if it was possible for Romania to carry out the IMF agreement, but stop receiving other instalments after the following two, Franks said: „Each country decides if they want to borrow from us. So this is a suzerain decision for Romania”, NewsIn says.