Europe’s most affected country by the pandemic, Italy, is still fighting its damages.
The country proposed a new stimulus package that is said to push the public debt to 157% of national out from the current goal of 155.7%. The new stimulus is said to be between 15-20 billion EUR, and experts expect to see an increase in the budget deficit by up to 11% of national output.
Giuseppe Conte, Italy's Prime Minister, said yesterday that the government is reviewing proposals meant to aid the struggling sectors while the country is waiting for help from the EU. The plan is to provide supplementary resources for a state-backed fund to protect banks from losses on loans to small and medium companies.
To soften up the blow that drove Italy into recession, until now, the deficit was raised to 75 billion EUR to 10.4% of national output for this year, after the budget gap for last year was only 1.6% - the lowest recorded in 12 years. According to sources familiar with the matter, the government is looking for ways to gain the parliament's authorization to increase its budget deficit for this year.
Until now, 180 million EUR was provided to families and businesses in the form of state-guaranteed banking loans.
Now, Italy40 is trading lower by almost 0.40%.
Read more about other countries that entered recession due to pandemic here!
Sources: reuters.com, finance.yahoo.com