Your Morning Fix

• The National Government’s debt service bill fell 65.63% year-on-year to PHP 183.36 billion in March due to lower amortization payments but surged 251.57% from February’s PHP 52.15 billion, with amortization making up 51.94% of the total.
• The Philippines reported 2.1 million visitor arrivals from January to April, reflecting a 0.82% decline compared to the same period last year. Of these arrivals, 1.93 million were foreign travelers, while 170,815 were overseas Filipinos.
• Net foreign direct investment (FDI) fell 61.9% year-on-year to USD 529 million in February, while total investments for the first two months of 2025 dropped 45.2%. The BSP attributed the decline to base effects, with equity capital investments plunging 85.9% and debt instruments down 35.4%.
• In April, Japanese investors significantly increased their foreign equity purchases, hitting a record high of 3.27 trillion yen (USD 22.37 billion) while withdrawing 1.08 trillion yen from foreign bonds.
• The US and China have agreed to temporarily reduce the steep tariffs they imposed on each other, easing trade tensions and boosting global stocks and the US dollar. Over the next 90 days, US tariffs on Chinese imports will drop from 145% to 30%, while China’s tariffs on US imports will decrease from 125% to 10%.