ABSTRACT
By the end of 1983 the total external debt of Latin America amounted to approximately US$310 billion. It is estimated to have grown by 7 percent during the year, a rate that was much lower than the 12 percent of 1982 and far below the growth rate of around 23 percent, which was the average between 1979 and 1981. In 1983, the international commercial banks granted virtually no new autonomous loans to the region, channeling their credit through the renegotiations of the external debt initiated by several Latin American countries. Under such circumstances, a substantial part of the increase in the debt was accounted for by the fact that the banks capitalized interest payments. The share of the banks in the region's external indebtedness has of course increased notably. The payments problems of the developing countries with regard to the private banks have been especially apparent in Latin America.
