IMF approves loan to Portugal

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) Friday approved a tranche of loan for Portugal in the amount of about 1.91 billion euros (2.55 billion U.S. dollars) after reviewing its recent economic reform performance. The IMF's Executive Board completed the eighth and ninth reviews of Portugal's performance under an economic program supported by a three-year Extended Fund Facility (EFF) arrangement, before giving the indebted euro zone country another aid disbursement, the IMF said in a statement. This brought the total disbursements under the EFF to about 24. 34 billion euros (32.52 billion dollars), the IMF said. Portugal in May 2011 inked a 78-billion-euro international rescue plan over three years with the IMF and its European partners to tide over its economic crisis. Established in 1974, the EFF mechanism aims at providing assistance to countries experiencing serious medium-term payments imbalances due to structural impediments in production and trade.