The Lebanese Central Bank’s quarterly bulletin shows some 32.34% depreciation in the net value of the securities portfolio on the books of the Lebanese financial sector (banks and financial institutions) during the first quarter of the year 2020 to LBP 2,154.5 billion ($1.43 billion), from LBP 3,184.1 billion ($2.11 billion) at year-end 2019. On an annual basis, the net value of securities portfolio held by the financial sector plunged by 56.96% from LBP 5,005.5 billion ($3.32 billion) at end of March 2019. In details, the value of equity securities, which constituted 55.99% of the Lebanese financial sector’s net securities portfolio, contracted by 34.38% year-to-date, and by 51.51% annually to LBP 1,206.2 billion ($0.80 billion). Concurrently, long-term debt securities, which represented some 43.65% of the sector’s net securities portfolio, fell by 29.77% since the beginning of the year and by 62.29% y-o-y to LBP 940.4 billion ($0.62 billion).

Commercial banks controlled the lion’s share (38.85%) of the financial sector’s placements in equity securities, followed by medium & long-term banks (31.06%) and financial institutions (17.83%). Commercial banks also detained the largest stake (56.19%) of the financial sector’s placements in long-term debt securities, trailed, and by far, by insurance companies (21.99%) and medium & long-term banks (15.42%).

From an asset allocation standpoint, the Lebanese financial sector’s securities portfolio was majority concentrated in U.S. equity instruments (25.33%), U.S. long-term debt securities (30.36%), and U.S. short-term debt securities (46.25%). The allocation of the investment portfolio by type of instrument across other countries at end of March 2020 is sketched in the table below: