[RSS][Colombia] Colombia withdraws from IMF flexible credit line agreement

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Colombia’s central bank has announced that the country will leave the IMF Flexible Credit Line (FCL) scheme after paying its debt in December.

The decision to leave the agreement was taken by the board of directors of the Central bank and the finance minister, and follows the IMF suspension of access to credit in April of this year.

Colombia’s central bank stated that the country’s foreign reserves are sufficient to do without the IMF credit line.

This decision comes at a time when the country’s international liquidity levels are adequate, with international reserves currently at $65.5 billion. This level has been achieved thanks to the $1.5 billion reserve accumulation program implemented in 2024 and the profitability of portfolios, which reached $4.5 billion during 2024 and 2025.
Bank of the Republic
The IMF decided to suspend Colombia’s access to its credit due to “a widening fiscal deficit and rising debt levels.”

Because the IMF decided to suspend Colombia’s access to its credit due to “a widening fiscal deficit and rising debt levels,” the government was paying the IMF a commitment fee for a service it no longer had access to.

According to Finance Minister German Avila, maintaining the FCL implied  “simply paying onerous fees that weren’t convenient to sustain.”

Colombia first entered the FCL agreement in 2009 and paid hundreds of millions of US dollars, just to have the credit line available since then.

The government used its line for the first and only time in 2020 under former president Ivan Duque, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the IMF, its flexible credit line is meant as a form of insurance, enabling a country to borrow money at relatively low interest rates.

Critics, however, argue that the IMF is not a neutral institution, but functions as an enforcer of neoliberalism that prioritizes creditor interests over social welfare.

Its policies often extract surpluses from poor countries to benefit financial centers, echoing imperial forms of tribute.

The central bank said that Colombia “continues to engage in constructive dialogue with the IMF on all aspects it deems necessary.”

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Source: https://colombiareports.com/colombia-wi ... agreement/