Policy Papers

April 23, 2025

2025 Handbook of IMF Facilities for Low-Income Countries

Description: This Handbook provides guidance to staff on the IMF’s facilities available to countries eligible to obtain concessional financing from the Fund under the PRGT, namely low-income countries (LICs). It updates the previous version of the Handbook that was published in March 2023 by incorporating modifications resulting from the 2024 Review of the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) Facilities and Financing and other recent policy papers. Designed as a comprehensive reference tool for program work in LICs, this Handbook also refers, in summary form, to a range of relevant policies that apply more generally to IMF members. As with all guidance notes, the relevant IMF Executive Board decisions, including the terms of the various LIC Trust Instruments that have been adopted by the Board, remain the primary legal authority on the matters covered in this Handbook.

April 22, 2025

Macroeconomic Developments and Prospects in Low-Income Countries—2025

Description: The 70 low-income countries (LICs) in the IMF’s membership experienced steady but modest growth in 2024, with marked divergence across countries. While 11 of the 20 fastest-growing countries in 2024 were LICs, many of the poorer and often also fragile and conflict-affected countries saw virtually no progress in per capita incomes over the past 15 years. Gradual fiscal consolidation proceeded in about half of the LICs, supporting further stabilization of public debt levels, but elevated debt service continues to constrain priority spending in many LICs. Growth is expected to accelerate over the medium term, while recent policy announcements on trade measures and official development aid will add to already elevated uncertainty and downside risks surrounding the outlook. Building resilience and reinvigorating inclusive growth are urgent. This agenda calls for further progress with implementing fiscal adjustments while minimizing the impact on growth, and more focus on measures to increase productivity. Enhancing spending efficiency and mobilizing domestic revenue will be critical, as well as improving economic institutions to support external capital inflows and domestic financial market development. Improvements to governance, education, and health, together with supporting physical capital formation and facilitating broader labor force participation, would help boost all factors of production and especially total factor productivity. On exchange rate regimes, there has been a clear trend among LICs to move away from market-determined exchange rates toward more tightly controlled arrangements, resulting in inconsistencies between de jure and de facto exchange rate arrangements. Overall, LICs progressed with developing FX markets, central banks play a lesser role in allocating foreign exchange, and greater reliance on FX auctions facilitates price discovery.

April 21, 2025

The Resilience and Sustainability Trust—Targeted Modification Regarding the Flexible Credit Line Arrangement as Concurrent Upper Credit Tranche-Quality Instrument

Description: This paper proposes a narrow and targeted change to the Resilience and Sustainability Trust Instrument relevant for cases where an arrangement under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF) is allowed to continue when the member switches from a Flexible Credit Line (FCL) arrangement to another qualifying UCT-quality instrument. In those cases, sufficient safeguards to anchor the RSF arrangement would be that, within the previous 12 months, the Executive Board approved the FCL arrangement or completed the mid-term review of the member’s qualification under the arrangement.

April 8, 2025

Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust—Guidance Note on the Strengthened Policy Safeguards

Description: In October 2024, as part of the Review of the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) Facilities and Financing, the IMF Executive Board established the “Strengthened Policy Safeguards (SPS)”—combining and replacing the previous High Access Procedures (HAP) and Enhanced Safeguards for debt sustainability and capacity to repay (ES)—thereby streamlining a key part of the safeguards framework for Fund lending. The SPS operates alongside the exceptional access framework and the Policy Safeguards for High Combined Credit (PS-HCC). The SPS framework applies when proposed access under a new arrangement, the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF), or an augmentation of access under an arrangement in the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) exceeds certain access thresholds, and when countries at high risk of, or in, overall debt distress request financing. This note provides guidance on how to implement the SPS. It supersedes the 2022 guidance note on enhanced safeguards.

March 21, 2025

Extension of the Period for Consent to Increase Quotas under the Sixteenth General Review of Quotas and to the NAB Rollback

Description: On November 8, 2024, the IMF's Executive Board approved a six-months extension of the period to consent to the quota increase and to the New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB) rollback under the Sixteenth General Review of Quotas (GRQ), through May 15, 2025. Such extension also extends the period of consent for quota increases under the 14th GRQ. The previous deadline was due to expire on November 15, 2024. However, the Board of Governors Resolution 79-1 provides that the Executive Board may extend the period for consent as it may determine.

March 18, 2025

Resilience and Sustainability Facility—Updated Operational Guidance Note

Description: This note provides general guidance on Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF) operations, including for arrangement requests and reviews. The RSF provides longer-term, affordable financing to members to help them address risks to prospective BOP stability stemming from longer-term macro critical structural challenges from climate change and pandemic preparedness. The note has benefited from early experience gained during the operationalization of the RSF; the outcome of the May 2024 RST Interim Review; the launch of the Enhanced Cooperation Framework for Scaled Up Climate Action with the World Bank; and the approval of Broad Cooperation Principles on Pandemic Preparedness in RSF operations with the World Bank and the World Health Organization.

March 13, 2025

List Of IMF Member Countries With Delays In Completion Of Article IV Consultations Or Mandatory Financial Stability Assessments Over 18 Months

Description: List Of IMF Member Countries With Delays In Completion Of Article IV Consultations Or Mandatory Financial Stability Assessments Over 18 Months

February 20, 2025

Debt Vulnerabilities And Financing Challenges In Emerging Markets And Developing Economies—An Overview Of Key Data

Description: Many emerging markets and developing economies face elevated debt vulnerabilities and financing needs. Following the 2020-21 surge in debt levels associated with the COVID-19 shock, and the subsequent tightening in global financial conditions, many emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs)1 are grappling with rising debt service burdens that squeeze the space available for development spending. Pandemic-induced deficits have declined, and debt levels have stabilized and are projected to remain stable or slightly decline under staff’s baseline assumptions. However, many EMDEs are confronting high costs of financing, large external refinancing needs, and a decline in net external flows amid important investment and social spending needs. To help address these challenges, countries would benefit from actions, both at domestic and international level, to proactively expand their capacity to finance development spending. There are also important risks to the baseline that will require careful monitoring. This paper aims to help inform the international debate on these issues by providing factual data and insight on the debt vulnerabilities and financing pressures facing EMDEs.

January 14, 2025

Considerations for the Comprehensive Review of Access Limits

Description: This paper provides background for an informal discussion to engage with Executive Directors, held on November 26, 2024, on the Comprehensive Review of GRA Access Limits. The General Resources Account (GRA) access limits are part of the Fund’s risk management framework. They help maintain a balance between the need to: (i) ensure that members have confidence in the availability of Fund financing; and (ii) preserve liquidity and the revolving nature of the Fund’s resources.

December 23, 2024

Comprehensive Review of GRA Access Limits

Description:

On December 17, 2024, the IMF’s Executive Board concluded the Comprehensive Review of General Resources Account (GRA) Access Limits. The review maintained the overall annual and cumulative GRA access limits at 200 and 600 percent of current quotas, respectively, keeping them unchanged from the existing temporary limits that were set to expire at the end of 2024. These limits constitute a 38 percent increase relative to the limits set in the previous comprehensive review in 2016. The outcome of the review enables the IMF to continue meeting the evolving needs of its member countries, providing greater stability and predictability in their access to IMF resources.

The Executive Board also approved adjustments to maintain access limits in nominal (Special Drawing Rights) terms when the general conditions for the effectiveness of the quota increase under the 16th General Review of Quotas are met. This approach is consistent with the Board’s decision in the recently approved Review of Charges and the Surcharge Policy and the Review of the PRGT Facilities and Financing. The Board also agreed that the next Comprehensive Review of GRA Access Limits is expected to take place on the standard five-year review cycle, with flexibility to conduct it earlier if circumstances warrant.

The last comprehensive review of the Fund’s GRA access limits took place in February 2016, establishing an annual limit of 145 percent and a cumulative limit of 435 percent of quotas. These limits were adjusted temporarily during the COVID-19 pandemic and after the geopolitical conflicts in recent years. Most recently, they were temporarily increased in March 2023 and were set to expire at the end of 2024.

Access limits are a key element of the Fund’s risk management framework: they provide members with confidence about the possible scale of financing that the Fund is prepared to provide in support of their adjustment efforts, while safeguarding Fund resources and preserving their revolving character. Overall GRA access limits are not ceilings but thresholds for enhanced scrutiny and safeguards through the exceptional access framework.

Two staff papers informed the Executive Board’s informal engagement (November 2024) and the formal meeting (December 2024) on this review.