Greece plans early IMF payment

Greece may be saddled with heavy debt, but a lot of it involves loans provided on very favorable terms. Moreover, the continuing sharp decline in bond yields makes further borrowing an attractive proposition.

There is a small part of Greek debt which is expensive to service and generally matures earlier than loans from the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), the European Union's temporary crisis resolution mechanism, and its replacement, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM).
Loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) represent only 2.6 percent of Greece's debt but are the most expensive by far. That is why the government plans to pay part of that debt - about 3 billion euros - early, with the intention of saving some 70-90 million in interest.
In an interview published in last Sunday's Kathimerini, Finance Minister Christos Staikouras said the...