On 27 September 2026, in a televised address, President Abelardo De la Espriella declared that the public accounts were in the red and entrusted his finance minister with talks with the International Monetary Fund. A month earlier, that same minister had ruled out, before an audience of bankers, any agreement with the institution. To this day no loan and no adjustment programme has been signed, and to present the episode as an imposition from Washington would be an error of method. What the documents show is less comfortable. The deficit figure that justifies the urgency was chosen by the government itself from among several possible ones, the cut was decided before the Fund arrived in the country, and the debt service due in 2027 exceeds, on the figures available, public investment. The Fund will come, if it comes, to certify a policy that in large part already exists.
A month between the no and the request
On 28 August, closing the Banking Convention in Cartagena, Finance Minister Miguel Gómez Martínez announced a spending cut and a rescue bill, and stated that the government would not seek an agreement with the IMF, according to Valora Analitik. A month later, his president was saying the opposite, and La República has noted the contradiction.
Reuters reported on 28 September, citing three anonymous sources, technical talks with the Fund in recent weeks, among them on financing at more favourable rates. Their dates are not established, so it cannot be said whether they began before or after the minister’s refusal, nor that the ministry hid anything. Nor do the statements consulted explain the gap, and that is a question this text leaves open to the party concerned.
The subsequent calendar is documented. The Fund resumed regular meetings with the economic authorities on 25 September after more than a year, according to El Tiempo. Its deputy managing director, Nigel Clarke, spent three days in the country and met Vice-President José Manuel Restrepo and Gómez. On the 28th the government asked to open the Article IV consultation, an annual review in which the institution’s staff analyse the country’s data and policies and draft a report for its Executive Board. Clarke said the Fund supports a “home-grown reform programme”, according to La Silla Vacía, and announced that a Finance Ministry delegation would travel to Washington the following week. He did not mention financing.
The previous government had kept its distance. Colombia had held a Flexible Credit Line since 2009, a form of insurance the Fund grants to countries with sound policies and which is drawn without negotiating new conditions. The Fund suspended access on 26 April 2025 after the Article IV assessment, and in late September 2025 the Banco de la República announced the cancellation of the arrangement. Petro boasted this year of having returned the US$5.4 billion drawn in 2020, and Minister Germán Ávila cancelled the April 2026 mission, according to El Tiempo. In June 2025 the government had activated the escape clause of the fiscal rule, which suspends until 2027 the legal limits on the deficit and debt in extraordinary circumstances. The state auditor, the Contraloría, warned that the government was itself projecting at the time a deficit above the limit.
A deficit that is chosen
The Medium-Term Fiscal Framework, the road map the ministry presents each June, put the 2026 deficit at 5.3% of GDP, about 106 trillion pesos, and net debt at 58.9%. A trillion here means a million million. The same document assumed that revenue would rise from 16.1% to 17.3% of GDP in a single year with no reform passed. The former head of the tax authority (DIAN), Lisandro Junco, called the document “pure smoke” and questioned that assumption, according to Cambio. It also counted on 30.2 trillion contingent on a reform that was never even brought to a vote, according to ANIF.
Two months later the new team calculated that without corrective measures the 2026 deficit would be 8.2%, and 7.2% with a cut of 21.9 trillion, 1.1% of GDP. Of that sum, 16.3 are required by law after the failure of the last tax reform and 5.6 are discretionary, according to Bloomberg Línea. According to Banco de Bogotá, some 30 trillion acknowledge spending pressures and another 30 stem from assuming that nothing will be done in 2026 to reduce the 2027 maturities, an assumption analysts call unusual.
For 2027 the draft budget projects 9.4%, about 200 trillion, against 4.5% in the Fiscal Framework. That 9.4% is not a forecast, and it is not false for that reason. It is the inertial scenario, the one that would result if nobody did anything, and the government presents it as such. According to Bloomberg Línea, starting from the worst case turns any progress into good news. The government announces an adjustment law worth 2.2 points of GDP, about 45 trillion, which would bring 2027 down to 7.2%. Two distinct sums, then, the 2026 cut, already decided, and the 2027 adjustment, which depends on a law not yet voted. Goldman Sachs and Citi estimate between 7.2% and 7.4% if Congress approves it.
The Colombian state spends about 40 trillion pesos a month and receives around 29 trillion, according to Finance Minister Miguel Gómez Martínez.
The ministry further claims that Petro’s draft omitted or understated items worth some 23 trillion, among them 6.5 for pensions and 9.6 for the fuel fund. These are claims by the executive that this text has not been able to check against the original document.
Two narratives contest this ground, and the data feed both. The right speaks of a hole left by Petro. His government suspended the fiscal rule and, according to Valora Analitik, spent half a point of GDP more with part of the 20.9 trillion it saved on interest. The left speaks of an inherited, structural problem. Between 2019 and 2024 revenue grew by 0.3 points of GDP and spending by 4.6, according to the Autonomous Fiscal Rule Committee cited by El Colombiano, and Congress left the financing bill without a vote. Neither narrative is enough. The two 2026 baselines differ by almost three points of GDP between June and August, and the ministry attributes the gap to the recognition of items and to debt service. Responsibility is shared among a pandemic, a decision not to correct, a Congress that refused revenue and a team that chose the darkest starting point.
Who collects the interest
Interest costs for 2026 rose from 3.2% to 3.8% of GDP in the updated financial plan, according to Forbes Colombia.
Public debt interest will reach 83.9 trillion pesos in 2027, or 3.9% of GDP, according to the 2026 Medium-Term Fiscal Framework.
With amortisation, debt service in 2027 came to 118 trillion against 89 of public investment in the previous government’s draft, according to Forbes Ecuador.
Someone collects. Domestic debt is issued as Treasury bonds, the TES, and its stock reached 763.6 trillion at the end of May, according to Casa de Bolsa. The largest holders are the pension funds, with around 249 trillion according to El Nuevo Siglo, which is to say the compulsory savings of workers. Foreigners come second, with 149.9 trillion and 19.6% according to Davivienda. A single American fund, PIMCO, accounts for 38.7 of the 44.9 trillion by which foreign holdings grew over the year to June, or 86%, according to La República citing Corficolombiana. La Silla Vacía warned in 2025 that if the state could not pay, pensioners would be the worst affected.
A point of context. Luis Carlos Sarmiento Angulo chairs Grupo Aval, which includes Banco de Bogotá, whose analysis is cited here, and Corficolombiana, from which another voice cited below comes. He also owns El Tiempo and Portafolio, and his group holds a stake in Porvenir, a pension fund manager holding public debt on behalf of its members. This does not invalidate the data, which have been checked against other sources. Whoever reads that the debt admits no discussion should know that several of those saying so have interests in it.
The government has not detailed which items the discretionary cut will touch. It has, however, announced through the minister on 14 and 15 September that the Rescue Law (Ley de Rescate), which will reach Congress in October, will gradually reduce the 4 per thousand tax on financial transactions and dismantle the wealth tax and its surcharge on large fortunes, according to La FM and Portafolio. The text is not known, and the documents consulted do not give the fiscal cost of these repeals. What is established is that the adjustment is announced on the spending side, that the taxes on the largest fortunes are among what is being scrapped, and that the payment of interest does not appear among the items under discussion.
The earthquake and the bill that grows
There is also 10 August. That day an earthquake of magnitude 7.4 shook the west of the country. By 12 August the National Disaster Risk Management Unit had counted 241 dead and more than 45,000 homes affected, according to La República. BTG Pactual put initial reconstruction at 20 trillion, 1% of GDP. Banco de Occidente estimates between 30 and 40 for infrastructure alone, up to 45% of this year’s public investment.
According to BTG, that figure is of the same order as the 21.9 trillion the minister meant to cut. If so, the cut frees no fiscal space, since reconstruction absorbs it. The earthquake serves a double function here, which this text puts forward as a reading and not as a fact. It is an exogenous variable that clouds the attribution of responsibility, because part of the 2026 deficit comes from a catastrophe no government caused. It is also an argument available to justify both the overrun and the severity of the cut. Gómez has said that the damage of four years cannot be repaired in fifty days of administration.
What the Fund signs and what the government decides
No one has officially confirmed what agreement Colombia is seeking. César Pabón, of Corficolombiana, points to the Precautionary and Liquidity Line, for countries that need backing but do not qualify for the Flexible Credit Line. Luis Fernando Mejía, of Lumen, sees an extended arrangement as more plausible, designed for structural problems and used by Colombia in 1999 for US$2.7 billion. In 2003 and 2005 there were stand-by agreements. The figures of US$15 to 20 billion in circulation have no official backing. What distinguishes the instruments is the conditions, and the conditions are the matter.
Senator Iván Cepeda, leader of the opposition, argued that the negotiation demands transformations of the state that would impoverish the middle classes. The Fund, through Clarke, speaks of a programme of the country’s own. Neither claim can be verified today, because there is no text.
The precedents allow two things the debate mixes up to be separated. Ecuador signed in 2024 an extended arrangement worth US$4 billion, raised to US$5 billion in July 2025. In September 2025 President Noboa abolished the diesel subsidy, cut the number of ministries from twenty to fourteen and announced 5,000 dismissals. A month of indigenous protests obtained nothing, according to EFE. Country risk fell from more than 2,000 points to under 500. But Ecuador Chequea established that the Fund had proposed in no report the elimination of the gas subsidy that a former minister presented in June 2026 as an unavoidable commitment. The conditionality written down and the one a government attributes to its creditor do not always coincide.
Argentina signed in April 2025 an agreement worth US$20 billion. The Fund reports less poverty and an early return to the markets, and admits that reserves are rebuilding slowly. These results are the Fund’s own and have not been checked here against the Argentine statistics institute.
The text is missing. The Rescue Law will reach Congress in October and the delegation travels to Washington next week, and only with both documents will it be possible to know how much of the adjustment answers to a creditor and how much to a political preference that seeks a signature in the Fund. Until then the only thing established is the dependence on debt, and no mission imposes it. It is imposed by a calendar of maturities, a bond market and the habit, adopted by successive governments long before this week, of treating the payment of interest as the only expense that is never discussed…
G.S.
Sources
- Reuters vía ThePrint, Colombia holds IMF financing talks as fiscal strain mounts
- La Silla Vacía, Colombia se sentará con el FMI en Washington para revisar sus cuentas
- La Silla Vacía, En gráficas, a quién le debe el Estado colombiano
- Asobancaria, 60ª Convención Bancaria 2026
- Valora Analitik, De la Espriella no buscará acuerdo con el FMI para ejecutar ajuste fiscal
- La República, Gobierno toca las puertas del FMI por cuarta vez desde comienzos de siglo
- El Tiempo, Tras más de un año, el FMI retoma reuniones periódicas con autoridades económicas de Colombia
- El Tiempo, Gobierno anuncia recorte de 21,9 billones al gasto y prepara ley para profundizar el ajuste fiscal
- Banco de la República, Cancelación de la Línea de Crédito Flexible
- FMI, Conclusión de la consulta del Artículo IV 2025 con Colombia
- Bloomberg Línea, Déficit fiscal superior al 9 %, el peor escenario que calcula el Gobierno
- Bloomberg Línea, Colombia busca corregir su crisis fiscal con el apoyo del FMI
- Bloomberg Línea, El terremoto le costará a Colombia hasta el 45 % de su inversión pública
- Cambio, Déficit de 106 billones, el reto económico que heredará el próximo presidente
- Forbes Colombia, Sinceramiento fiscal eleva el déficit a 9,4 % del PIB para 2027
- Colombia.com, El Gobierno prepara un fuerte ajuste del gasto en 2026
- Valora Analitik, Balance fiscal del gobierno Petro
- El Colombiano, La deuda está en el punto más alto de la historia
- Yahoo Noticias, Colombia deberá pagar 83,9 billones en intereses de su deuda pública en 2027
- Yahoo Noticias, Fondos de pensiones y bancos comerciales impulsan compras de TES en mayo
- El Nuevo Siglo, Fondos de pensiones con 249 billones, los mayores tenedores de deuda colombiana
- La República, Pimco impulsó cerca de 86 % del crecimiento de los TES en manos de extranjeros en el último año
- La FM, Gobierno reducirá gradualmente el 4×1.000 y desmontará el impuesto al patrimonio
- Portafolio, Gobierno alista reducción progresiva del 4×1.000, Ley de Rescate será presentada en octubre
- Forbes Ecuador, Terremoto en Colombia, reparar los daños costará 6.350 millones de dólares
- La República, La reconstrucción por el terremoto costaría 6.350 millones de dólares
- BusinessCol, Colombia considera nuevo acuerdo con el FMI
- Swissinfo (EFE), Ecuador pasa quinto examen del FMI
- Swissinfo (EFE), Ecuador anuncia su segunda emisión de bonos soberanos en 2026
- FMI, Ecuador, segunda revisión del acuerdo SAF y ampliación del programa
- FMI, Ecuador, quinta revisión del acuerdo SAF
- Ecuador Chequea, FMI no exige eliminar subsidio al gas
- FMI, Argentina, segunda revisión del acuerdo SAF
