government

Profits soar from property sales

The government’s FFD is expected to get a large boost from property sales in the reverted areas.

The government has seen its profits from the sale of former U.S.-occupied properties increase dramatically in the past two years. In 2007, the government received $32.5 million from the sale of property in the so-called “reverted” areas. This was $19.7 million more than in 2006, when it received $12.8 million.

So far this year, the Unidad Administrativa de Bienes Revertidos, which oversees these sales, has already made $29.7 million. “The figures speak for themselves,” said Julio Ross Anguizola, administrator of the Unidad Administrativa de Bienes Revertidos.

Anguizola said that escalating property values are the major reason that profits have increased. He said that all of the sales, which are conducted by auction, have exceeded the appraised value of the property.

The money from the 2007 sales has been transferred to the Fondo Fiduciario para el Desarrollo (FFD). The 2008 profits are currently being held in time deposits at the Banco Nacional de Panamá. They are slated to be deposited in the FFD at the end of the year.

The money is expected to boost the balance of the FFD, which reached its lowest point in the past eight years at the end of 2007. At that time, it had a balance of about $1.1 billion. The fund’s balance was $1.3 billion in 2000.

One of the reasons that the fund’s balance has been reduced is that the government failed to deposit $118 million in proceeds from sales of reverted properties from 2000 to 2004. Instead, it used the money to offset spending in its annual budget.

The fund was created to generate money to improve the country’s infrastructure and to pay for programs aimed at alleviating poverty.