By Marcin Grajewski
BRUSSELS, March 16 (Reuters) - Slovenia may issue another 1 billion euros ($1.3 billion) of bonds in April or May despite difficult market conditions, a cabinet minister said on Monday.
Development and European Affairs Minister Mitja Gaspari also said Slovenia's growth could stagnate or turn slightly negative in 2009, a more optimistic forecast than the 1.0 percent contraction expected by the International Monetary Fund.
He told Reuters in an interview that Slovenia was still ready for another sovereign bond issue this year, despite a recent Finance Ministry statement that there was no need to tap international markets for now.
Slovenia issued a three-year, 1-billion-euro eurobond in January in an attempt to ease the national impact of the credit crunch.
"Slovenia already made one issue in January, it is ready to maker another one in April or May," said Gaspari, a former central bank governor who advises the prime minister on handling the financial crisis.
"The first one was 1 billion (euros), another one could probably be of a similar size," he added.
Gaspari said there was no danger of Slovenia's healthy AA credit rating being downgraded, but large issuances in big EU countries were making it harder for smaller nations to tap the markets.
"We can expect quite a lot of ... issuers in the next few months, which is a potential danger for smaller issuers like Slovenia, not because of the quality of the ratings, but because of not enough savings being available in the market," he said.
Many EU countries are borrowing more than earlier planned to try to spend their way out of the worst recession in decades.
Slovenia is among the most economically developed countries that joined the European Union in 2004. The former Yugoslav republic of 2 million people joined the euro zone in 2007.
Gaspari said Slovenia's economy was likely to stagnate this year, although he still hoped a small amount of growth was possible.
"Based on negative economic developments in Europe, especially Germany, Italy, France and Austria, we have to adjust our projections downwards to maybe around zero," he said.
"Nobody knows whether this is the last adjustment." (Editing by Dale Hudson)