Puerto Rico's government and public bodies missed more bond payments Wednesday as the island remained mired in a debt crisis.
According to the Puerto Rico Financial Advisory Authority and Fiscal Agency, the commonwealth government didn't make its general obligation payment. Bond payments were skipped by the Government Development Bank for Puerto Rico, Public Finance Corporation, and Puerto Rico Infrastructure Finance Authority. The GDB owed $279 million, according to FAAFA. The PFC owed $21 million, according to the version of a fiscal plan then-Gov. Alejandro García Padilla submitted in mid-October. FAFAA didn't announce the amount not paid for the other bonds.
Full payments were made Wednesday by the Puerto Rico Sales Tax Financing Corporation (COFINA), the Puerto Rico Industrial Development Company, the Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Authority, and the Highways and Transportation Authority.
In mid-2015 García Padilla said the island's $70 billion of debt was unpayable unless the economy improved. In August of that year the PFC stopped paying its debt. Last year President Obama signed the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economy Stability Act, creating an oversight board that has given the current governor, Ricardo Rossell-, until the end of this month to come up with a 10-year fiscal plan.
In other Puerto Rico news on Wednesday, the Puerto Rico Treasury said General Fund Net Revenues came in 3.3% below projections for December and 2% above projections for the first six months of the fiscal year.
In both periods individual income taxes lagged behind budgeted values while Law 154 (foreign company) taxes exceeded these values. Through the first six months the former was 3.4% or $30 million below projection and the latter was 15.2% or $132.2 million above.
In the first six months the General Fund received $31 million more in sales and use taxes than budgeted and $76 million less in non-resident withholding taxes.
For the first half of the fiscal year, July 1 to Dec. 31, General Fund net revenues were 1.9% higher than those of the first six months of the preceding fiscal year.
