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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2023
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BPL: We’ve regained 56% of fuel cost ‘under-recovery’ By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net BAHAMAS Power & Light (BPL) yesterday revealed it had regained 56 percent of its “under-recovered” fuel costs by end-August 2023 while reassuring that surging global oil prices will not derail this strategy. The state-owned utility monopoly, in response to Tribune Business questions, asserted it will not have to adjust previously forecast fuel charge rates and timelines despite the pressures from rising global oil prices that market observers believe could hit $100 per barrel before month’s end. Higher oil prices mean BPL has to pay extra for the fuel that it acquires
t 1MFEHFT PJM QSJDF TVSHF XPO U EFSBJM TUSBUFHZ t 3FBTTVSFT OP DIBOHF UP SBUFT BOE UJNFMJOF t A3FBM UJNF CJMMJOH UP SFTVNF JO T 2 at spot (present) market costs, which could potentially inflict further pain on already-suffering households and businesses who, for the past year, have had to grapple with fuel charge increases of up to 163 percent as the utility recovers costs that it previously failed to bill consumers for. However, BPL pledged that current oil market volatility will have no impact on the projected upcoming fuel charges that it unveiled in its so-called “glide path” strategy on October 4, 2022. And it also “does
not anticipate” that it will have to extend this strategy beyond the forecast end-2024 first quarter finish. BPL thus told this newspaper that it will “resume real time billing” in the 2024 second quarter, which starts in April, meaning that the fuel charge seen on household and business bills will solely reflect the price/costs BPL is paying on the open market. Presently, and for the next six months, all electricity bills will reflect oil market
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S&P: Austerity ‘likely’ to meet Gov’t debt targets By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net STANDARD & Poor’s (S&P) last night argued that the Government will likely struggle to meet its debt reduction targets “without material new revenues, significant cost-cutting or well above average economic growth”. The rating agency, in its country report on The Bahamas that made no change to this nation’s creditworthiness, said the debt blow-out produced by Hurricane Dorian and the COVID pandemic means the Government’s “previous fiscal consolidation plans” are insufficient
to achieve its fiscal goals unless economic growth is strong enough to avoid the imposition of further austerity measures. Joining the Moody’s and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in warning that The Bahamas faces “elevated” external financing risks, with the Government requiring $2.1bn during the present 2023-2024 fiscal year to refinance maturing debt, S&P nevertheless hinted it was optimistic that it will source the necessary funding to cover the $300m foreign currency bond coming due for repayment in January 2024.
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‘Structural vulnerabilities’ weigh on robust growth By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net STANDARD & Poor’s (S&P) yesterday forecast Bahamian economic growth for 2024 will fall back to historical trends at 1.8 percent as it warned that such levels, together with “structural vulnerabilities”, weigh on improved credit ratings. The credit rating agency, in an analysis that did not impact this nation’s creditworthiness, acknowledged that The Bahamas has enjoyed a “robust” tourismdriven recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic with total visitor arrivals for the
2023 first half some 67 percent ahead of the prior year at five million. But, while gross domestic product (GDP) per capita is expected to return to preCOVID levels by year-end 2023, S&P voiced concern that despite expectations of strong economic growth for “the next two to three years” this country’s efforts to improve its creditworthiness and escape ‘junk’ territory are impaired by its “below average” long-term performance in comparison to similarly-rated countries. “The Bahamian economy has shown strong growth through 2023, supported
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Super Value chief: Food inflation ‘more like’ 30% By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net SUPER Value’s principal yesterday said a review of 15 commonly-bought items revealed The Bahamas sustained food inflation of around 30 percent over the past two years, adding: “The customers are retraining us.” Rupert Roberts told Tribune Business that the simple assessment, involving products shoppers purchase on a weekly basis such as bread, rice and poultry, exposed that the extent of food price increases between 2021 and 2023 was triple or three times’ what some of his buyers had projected And, predicting that surging global oil prices will send Bahamian gasoline prices to $6.25 per gallon within weeks, he predicted that the ever-increasing cost of living - and the crisis it poses for many middle and lower income households - will take a growing cut of Super Value’s sales
RUPERT ROBERTS and those of all grocery retailers. “Somebody asked the buyers what they thought inflation was since 2021,” Mr Roberts told this newspaper. “They said probably 10 percent. I had the Abaco store take 15 items that customers buy each week, and it came to 30 percent.... The figure was more like 30 percent. We tried to pick the items everybody shops for every week - the bread, the rice, the poultry and milk. That’s what we came up with.”
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