Business

The Treasury Depart-ment said Wednesday that it has scaled back its annual borrowing capacity by US$232 billion since April and plans further gradual cuts in coming months.

The cuts are coming after a massive expansion of the government's borrowing over the past two years as the annual federal deficit hit US$1.41 trillion last year and is forecast to hit a new record of US$1.47 trillion this year.

Treasury officials said that the reductions in borrowing capacity can be achieved because the improving economy is boosting tax receipts and many of the emergency programmes enacted to deal with the deep recession and financial crisis are being phased out.

Officials said that since April, the cuts already made total US$232 billion in reduced borrowing capacity over a 12-month period.

Those cuts projected over 12 months include US$72 billion trimmed from the two-year note, US$60 billion reduced from the three-year note and another US$60 billion trimmed from the five-year note.

In addition, projected reductions of US$36 billion have been made in the seven-year note and US$4 billion in the 10-year note.

"Based on current fiscal forecasts, Treasury expects to continue to decrease coupon auction sizes at a gradual pace," Treasury said in a statement.

Treasury on Monday announced that it will be trimming its estimate of the amount it will need to borrow this budget year, dropping it to US$1.438 trillion.

That would still be the second-highest borrowing total in history, but it will be 19.5 per cent lower than last year's record borrowing of US$1.786 trillion. The current budget year will end September 30.

Late last month, the administration estimated that the overall budget deficit for this year will total a record US$1.47 trillion.

However, that projection represented an improvement from February when the administration had estimated the deficit for this year would total US$1.56 trillion.

The higher borrowing has occurred as the government has spent billions of dollars in the past two years to cope with a deep recession and stabilise the financial system.

While the administration contends that all the spending prevented the country from falling into an even deeper recession, Republicans are hoping to use the soaring deficits as a campaign issue in the upcoming congressional elections.

The Treasury Department's borrowing projections were released as part of its announcement of a series of quarterly auctions it will hold over three days next week, beginning on Tuesday.

Treasury said it will auction US$34 billion in a three-year note on Tuesday, US$24 billion in a 10-year note the following day and US$16 billion in a 30-year bond on August 12.

- AP