Moody’s Downgrades Uganda’s Ratings, Changes Outlook to Stable
Moody’s Ratings has downgraded Uganda’s long-term foreign-currency and local-currency issuer ratings to B3 from B2 and changed the outlook to stable from negative.
In its latest rating note on the sovereign, Moody’s said the downgrade of the ratings reflects diminished debt affordability and increasingly constrained financing options, amid greater reliance than in the past on comparatively costly domestic and non-concessional sources of external financing.
According to the note, Uganda’s external vulnerability risk remains elevated, a reflection of a more challenging external debt servicing profile, the persistence of tighter global financial conditions, and diminished foreign exchange reserve adequacy.
Meanwhile, the country’s outlook was revised to a stable outlook, reflecting Moody’s assessment that at the B3 rating level, Uganda’s credit challenges and strengths are incorporated.
It said downside risks relate to debt affordability and external vulnerability challenges. Moody’s added that gradual improvements in revenue mobilisation capacity would, if further sustained, support fiscal consolidation efforts and could eventually provide relief to the debt affordability challenges faced by the government, but face execution risks.
Concurrently, Uganda’s local and foreign currency country ceilings were lowered to Ba3 and B1 from Ba2 and Ba3, respectively. The local currency country ceiling is three notches above the sovereign rating to take into account the low footprint of the government in the economy, notwithstanding relatively high external imbalances and exposure to domestic and geopolitical risk, Moody’s said.
The foreign currency ceiling maintains a one-notch gap to the local currency ceiling to reflect Moody’s assessment of limited transfer and convertibility risks in view of Uganda’s open capital account and a moderate level of external debt, notwithstanding constraints to policy effectiveness.
According to Moody’s, the structure of Uganda’s debt has gradually but markedly become less favourable over the past few years. It noted that higher reliance on domestic and non-concessional sources of external financing has contributed to an increase in the government’s borrowing costs.
Although Uganda’s debt burden which printed at 47.1% of GDP in fiscal 2023, the fiscal year ending on 30 June 2023) is below the median of B-rated peers (53.1% of GDP), the weighted average interest rate for Uganda’s total debt stood at 7.3% as of December 2023, having risen from 6.4% in June 2022 and 5.6% in June 2019.
It said comparatively expensive domestic borrowing has been key in financing a wider fiscal deficit since the COVID-19 pandemic. Uganda’s net domestic financing amounted to 3.6% of GDP annually between fiscal 2020 and fiscal 2023 on average, compared to 1.4% of GDP over the preceding four fiscal years, according to the rating note.
The rating agency said domestic debt makes up 41% of public debt as of fiscal 2023 but 80% of interest payments. The share of public external debt on non-concessional and commercial terms has also increased, representing 26.7% of the external debt stock in December 2023.
It also noted that the country’s debt affordability has consequently weakened, with a widening gap between Uganda and rating peers that Moody’s expects will persist. Interest payments consumed 22.2% of government revenue in fiscal 2023, up from 14.2% in fiscal 2019.
By contrast, the median for B-rated peers has risen more slowly from 8.4% to 10.6% over the same period. Moody’s expects the ratio for Uganda to remain at similar levels of above 20% through at least fiscal 2025, limiting fiscal space to respond to future shocks.
Analysts said efforts to contain borrowing costs have been complicated by a tighter global financing environment and the recurrent use of supplementary budgets, driving increased domestic issuances.
For example, the adoption of a supplementary budget in December 2023 raised the target for domestic borrowing in fiscal 2024 by up to UGX3.5 trillion, Moody’s said in the rating note.
It added that beyond the increasing cost of debt, the higher reliance in recent years on net domestic financing and ad-hoc funding methods – such as advances from the Bank of Uganda (BoU) to the government to cover temporary deficiencies of recurrent revenue – points to increasingly constrained access to funding.
Notwithstanding the signature of a service-level agreement between the BoU and the Ministry of Finance in 2022 to govern central bank financing of the government, difficulties in securing timely financing have caused recurrent delays in the repayment of the stock of outstanding BoU advances.
The latter stood at 3.1% of GDP in fiscal 2023 and are not included in the debt ratio reported by the government, according to the rating note.
Moody’s said the suspension of new World Bank project approvals, which remains ongoing since August 2023 in response to Uganda’s enactment of the Anti-Homosexuality Act (AHA), risks adding to the government’s growing dependence on non-concessional financing if further sustained.
“While the government could seek to reduce the number of projects it implements in the medium term if the suspension persists, or seek alternative concessional partners, a continuation of the freeze would nevertheless imply a reduced range of financing options: the World Bank is one of Uganda’s largest creditors, accounting for around a fifth of Uganda’s public debt”.
In turn, more restricted financing options risk contributing to keeping the cost of debt high, the rating note added. The note stated that Uganda’s external vulnerability risk remains higher than in the past, a reflection of a more challenging external debt servicing profile, the persistence of tighter global financial conditions, and diminished foreign exchange reserve adequacy.
More costly government debt service and lower new external financing inflows have complicated the BoU’s efforts to rebuild its foreign exchange reserve buffer. Analysts stated that the country’s foreign exchange reserves stood at a three-year low of $3.5 billion in March 2024, equivalent to around 3.3 months of import cover excluding oil sector development-related imports.
Although Moody’s expects reserve coverage to stabilise at these levels and Uganda’s exchange rate flexibility acts as a mitigant, a sustained shortfall in official financing could weaken the country’s external position and further reduce reserve adequacy.
Uganda will continue to face a more challenging external debt servicing profile over the next few years, as principal repayments on external borrowings rise and repayments to the IMF begin from 2025 onward, according to the rating note.
Moody’s projects external principal payments to average 1.5% of GDP between fiscal 2024 and fiscal 2026, up from an annual average of 0.8% of GDP between fiscal 2020 and fiscal 2023.
This is reflected in Moody’s external vulnerability indicator (the ratio of external debt payments and non-resident deposits to foreign exchange reserves), which is projected to remain at around 88% by the end of 2025, somewhat higher than the B-rated median of 64%, and up from 42% in 2019.
According to the rating update, the stable outlook reflects Moody’s assessment that the risks to Uganda’s credit profile are balanced at the B3 level. Planned fiscal consolidation efforts and a strong growth outlook will support a stabilisation in the debt burden at close to 50% of GDP in fiscal 2024, and gradual debt reduction over the medium term, Moody’s said.
Analysts noted that a sustained consolidation path hinges on continued progress in the implementation of the government’s domestic revenue mobilisation strategy, as well as improvements in overall public financial management and the efficiency of capital spending to catalyse more growth.
Moody’s projects the fiscal deficit to remain around 4% of GDP in fiscal 2024 and fiscal 2025, from 5.5% of GDP in fiscal 2023. However, a large upward revision passed by parliament to the planned fiscal 2025 budget introduces heightened uncertainty.
Gradual improvements in revenue mobilisation capacity could, if further sustained, eventually provide relief to liquidity pressures and the debt affordability challenges faced by the government.
While revenue collection remains weaker than peers, gradual improvements have been made since 2010; the overall government revenue ratio has nearly doubled from 8% of GDP in that year to 14.4% of GDP in fiscal 2023.
Under its medium-term revenue strategy, the government remains committed to increasing the ratio of domestic revenue collection to GDP by 0.5 pp annually, including through the rationalisation of exemptions and improved tax administration.
Moody’s baseline integrates further improvements in the government revenue ratio to around 15.6% of GDP by fiscal 2025, although higher interest expenditures will offset the impact on debt affordability.
These improvements are subject to execution risks related to weaknesses in public financial management, underscored by the underperformance of budgetary targets in the current fiscal year to date.
Moody’s expects that Uganda’s track record of macroeconomic stability will be maintained. Uganda’s growth performance has been above that of B-rated peers over the past decade, with real GDP growth of 4.7% on average, compared with a median of 3.8% for B-rated countries.
Moody’s expects growth to accelerate to a rate of 6-7% over the medium-term horizon, on the back of the developments in the oil sector, ongoing investments in transport and energy generation infrastructure to address structural constraints, and favourable demographic trends.
These dynamics are balanced by the economy’s small size, vulnerability to climate-related shocks, and low wealth levels, limiting shock-absorption capacity.
Moody’s said Uganda’s prospects over the longer term will be shaped by progress in oil sector investment. Oil production is targeted to start in 2025 and reach peak output of 230,000 barrels per day (bpd).
The sector could strengthen growth, fiscal revenue, and the external position, which would bolster Uganda’s creditworthiness provided prudent management of oil wealth. Despite progress, the completion of oil infrastructure projects remains vulnerable to implementation risks, as past delays indicate.
Further delays in the start of oil production would lead to wider external deficits over the longer term if debt—ccontracted mainly to finance oil-related projects—wwere not compensated by higher foreign-exchange receipts and revenue generation capacity. #Moody’s Downgrades Uganda’s Ratings, Changes Outlook to Stable
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