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00:00We know that person to target was given temporary emergency powers just last night to get a sense of the latest directive from the president . Yes we've determined that we have to shut down our country and of course our economy to combat the spread of the Corona virus . And these have very serious effects on the livelihood of our people. So the first effort that we have made is to seek emergency powers for our president primarily to align our budgets and the funds we have outside of the budget which are with government owned corporations to use to support the people who have lost their livelihood during this period of lockdown . And then therefore we have a program which allows the president to realign budgets up to roughly 4 billion US dollars to provide direct subsidies to people who are in the informal sector of our economy. And this will David Ingles. Yes . Talk to us about the stimulus package. What will you be targeting . The first package we have is a package to support our people the people who have lost their livelihoods. The second part of the package also is to support the front liners in our combat against the Corona virus. And the third part of that package is to provide the funding from your sources . We are getting funding from our multilateral agencies and the central bank has agreed to purchase up to 300 billion barrels worth of government bonds as well as reduce the reserve requirements of banks by 200 basis points. We should release another 200 billion pesos into the economy. So our first package really test has three goals support our support of our people those who have lost their livelihoods support of our airports the airports of our front lines to combat the corona virus by purchasing personal personal safety equipment medical ventilators and special guests. Yes sir. And I want to talk with some point the economy as a whole . There is a lot of talk that you are hoping to raise one billion dollars from lenders. Can you confirm that. Are you hoping to do that. Yes we are. We are in a box with them right now. And the talks are going well. And this will go a long way to support our efforts to combat this virus . Secretary to make us a key in Hong Kong. Thank you so much for joining us. How high are you willing to push the budget deficit now. The Economic Planning Agency data saying that possibly widen every from four point four percent to five point four percent of GDP. Is that a likely possibility now . Well the way it looks it all depends on how long this this emergency will last. And we are certainly looking at a drop in our GDP growth possibly to one half of one percent negative . That's assuming that it will last the whole year. We do nothing . And secondly definitely our tax collections are going to be very weak partly because of this shutdown. So we are definitely looking at a budget deficit higher than what we plan of between three and three point six percent . At what cost though. I mean how do you plan to fund the increased spending now. You mentioned a bit more about the bond buying. Do you think what you what the central bank is doing now is enough or are you looking to tap into more domestic and overseas markets at this point . We are going to tap old markets at this point. Again as I said depends on how long this lasts. But we are prepared very well prepared to increase our debt levels. As you know we have reduced our debt levels from over 70 percent of GDP 41 percent of GDP now. So we are in a very good position to combat this growing the virus and we have the capacity to do that . Are you concerned about the push back from credit ratings because your team was actually looking for the to a grade by 2022 . Well I guess the Corona virus chase all that . We understand the concerns of the credit agencies. But again I suppose we are not the only ones in this book. I think practically the whole world is facing the same the same problems that we do . Our main concern now. I said it's no longer the credit agency's opinion the bus but the survival of our people. We need the support to those whose livelihoods are affected. The. And of course our general support supporting our general economy to be ready for the inevitable return of normalcy. CAC Domingos said the Philippines shut its financial markets the first country to do that. Are there plans to do to do that again. Should the situation worsen from here. No there are no plans to do that . We did that initially to make sure that the markets had time to consider the developments. So far I'm told today yesterday and today the markets substantially . How deeply do you expect this volatility to go . Well we've already dropped almost 50 percent in the stock market so I don't know how much or you can go. But basically you know this is a trend around the world and we we are not out of the B out of the field the ball field. So basically we are we're in there. But again I want to emphasize our debt capacity is very strong. Our economic fundamentals are very strong. And we will . We will take advantage of the return to normal normalcy . Despite the fundamentals the Philippine composite index is still among the worst performers in the world. Yet to date I'm wondering whether state funds you instructed them to help support the stock market. They failed to do that. Is there scope for the state funds to do even more at this point in time . We will keep us our steady hand in the market and we will see how this develops. As you know the state funds have a responsibility to the future generations as well. So we are going well. We are supportive of the market. We have to do it in a very responsible way . So what are the ISE know. Do you have . Well we have presidents how we support the market . No fear of being my guess. Well no one is to show that we are in total command of the situation and that we are making progress against the Corona virus. That's number one. Number two we have to release at least 200 billion pesos. We will release starting the end of this month. Two hundred billion vessels by the reduction of the reserve requirements. And that should provide liquidity to the market. The central bank of course is ready to purchase our treasury bills. Of course for a limited time because we don't expect this this corona virus to last forever . We're looking at an end to it in the next five or six months .

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Philippines to Boost Debt to Combat Coronavirus: Finance Secretary

Philippine Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez discusses the measures the government is taking amid the coronavirus outbreak. He speaks with Haslinda Amin and Yvonne Man on "Bloomberg Markets." (Source: Bloomberg)

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