Puerto Rico doesn't expect to sell bonds before 2025

Puerto Rico's latest capital improvement plan shifts from depending on debt to relying on the federal government.

The plan, released by the Puerto Rico Department of Planning this weekend, expects Puerto Rico's government to issue only $300,000 in bonds in the period from July 1, 2021, to June 30, 2025, and those were sold last year by the Puerto Rico Infrastructure and Finance Authority.

Bloomberg News

In its two volume four-year investment program, the department says it expects $6.658 billion in capital spending in fiscal years 2022 through 2025 and the same in resources.

It expects 82.2% of the financial resources to come from the federal government, 6.6% from other resources, and 0.004% from debt.

By comparison, in the four-year investment program from fiscal 2015 to fiscal 2018 (the last one released before Puerto Rico defaulted on its general obligation bonds and Congress passed the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act), loans and bonds were expected to account for 26.9% and the federal government was expected to account for 21.2% of resources.

The agencies expected to use the greatest portions of the expenditures are: the Education Department ($2.739 billion), the Highways and Transportation Department ($1.58 billion), the University of Puerto Rico ($557 million), and the Aqueducts and Sewer Authority ($434 million).

"This document constitutes a short- and medium-term planning instrument aligned with the Puerto Rico fiscal plan and with the provisions of the PROMESA Law ... that brings negotiations and consensus between the government of Puerto Rico and the Fiscal Oversight Board focused on fiscal restructuring," the department said.