The Plenary of the Parliament voted the sanction of no. 79-1 of the decision of the Board of Governors of the International Monetary Fund on the Sixteenth General Revision of Participation Shares and the table for the reduction of New Borrowing Arrangements.

As the Deputy Minister of National Economy and Finance, Christos Dimas, emphasized during his presentation, in the Plenary Session of the Parliament, “the credibility and prestige of our country is strengthened through the strengthening of its participation in a large international economic organization (IMF), which is the lender of last resort in cases of serious fiscal imbalances or imbalances in their balance of payments’.

The law concerns the increase in the quotas of the 190 member states of the IMF by 50%, in proportion to their participation in the capital of the Fund and the reduction of the New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB Rollback).

The total IMF holdings will total 715.7 billion SDRs (960 billion USD), i.e. an increase of 238.6 billion SDRs or 320 billion USD, with the said increase to be accompanied by a reduction in New Borrowing Arrangements from SDR 364 billion (USD 485 billion) to SDR 303 billion (USD 404 billion).

With reference to our country, the above decisions entail an increase in our share of participation from 2.4 billion Special Drawing Rights SDR (3.2 USD) to 3.6 billion Special Drawing Rights SDR (4.9 billion USD ) and reducing the amount of New Borrowing Arrangements from SDR 1.7 billion (USD 2.2 billion) to SDR 1.4 billion (USD 1.9 billion).

As is well known, the Special Drawing Rights are a type of international reserve asset, available to IMF members and the IMF itself, created by the Fund based on a weighted basket of five major international currencies which obviously includes the euro together with the US dollar, the yen, the pound sterling and the Chinese currency in order to be able to exchange these rights for other currencies or to repay the obligations of the member countries of the IMF such as the repayment of loans to it.

What Greece gains by increasing its participation share:

Participation shares in the IMF do not only have the role of the capital that each member owes to the Fund, but are also linked to other important functions, namely:

  • They determine the number of votes each member is entitled to in the Fund’s decision-making processes.
  • They determine the amount of aid a country can receive from the Fund.
  • They determine the share of each country in the event that the Fund proceeds with a general SDR allocation, as it happened in August 2021, when our country received from the IMF approximately USD 3 billion from the IMF’s total allocation of USD 650 billion. US dollars.

Based on the above, Greece has every reason to increase its participation in the IMF in absolute numbers while maintaining its participation in the Fund. Moreover, indicative of the consensus that exists regarding the above issue is that on December 15, 2023, when the voting process of the IMF proposal to increase the participation shares was completed, the proposal was overwhelmingly voted by all members of the Fund representing 92.86% of the total voting power.

The increase in Participation Shares in the IMF, combined with the reduction of New Credit Arrangements, will maintain its lending capacity at SDR 696 billion, while at the same time reducing the Fund’s dependence on lending resources, it will restore the primary role of quotas to the Fund’s lending capacity and will strengthen the IMF’s role at the center of the Global Financial Safety Net. It will also strengthen the IMF’s ability to help ensure global financial stability and respond to the potential needs of its members in an uncertain and shock-prone world.

During his introduction, the Deputy Minister of National Economy and Finance Christos Dimas stated: “The country’s participation in increasing the participation shares while reducing the New Loan Arrangements further strengthens the presence of our country in one of the strongest international economic organizations, such as the International Monetary Fund, while at the same time it marks the transition of Greece from borrower’s side to the creditor’s side’.