Troubled financial waters

The complications posed by the refugee crisis and stagnant legislature found Lebanon’s public finances in troubled waters. There have, however, been some positive developments. The Ministry of Finance has again issued Eurobonds – the purchasing of which has demonstrated a local appetite to continue financing public expenditures; it moved closer to reconciling public accounts and Lebanon’s bid to join the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development may soon be approved. Executive sits down with the director general of the Ministry of Finance, Alain Bifani, to discuss the impact of these developments on state finances. E  In April 2015, you met with the United States Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy and the Environment. Can you tell us about your talking points for the meeting and if there were any practical results from that meeting? We were at the spring meetings of the [International Monetary Fund] (IMF) and the