World Bank Chief Economist Indermit Gill, speaking with Reuters on Monday, said that rising debt levels among seemingly healthy countries in Asia could drag growth in the region below currently forecast levels.
Additional quotes:
Increased government borrowing from domestic markets would limit the level of credit available to private firms, resulting in faltering investment.
There’s a lot of government consumption and private consumption being financed through debt. There is not a lot of investment being financed through credit, and that’s not great.
We have simultaneous problems of too much debt and too little investment.
The result could be much lower growth than we were forecasting.
The world’s focus on the poorest countries that were covered by the Common Framework could lead to surprises in other countries that were seemingly healthy.