The debt ratio fell to 94.2% from 95.2% in the previous quarter due to the greater increase in GDP
MADRID, 21 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) -
The volume of public debt accumulated by the Member States of the euro zone reached a record of 12.101 billion euros in the second quarter of 2022, compared to 11.978 billion in the previous quarter, although the ratio in relation to GDP fell to 94.2 % from 95.2% in the first three months of the year, as reported by the Community Statistics Office, Eurostat.
In this way, the volume of debt in the eurozone has increased by more than 2 trillion euros since the fourth quarter of 2019, the last complete quarter before the Covid-19 pandemic, when debt totaled 10.058 trillion euros, and represents practically twice as much as the 6.28 trillion debt of the euro zone in the second quarter of 2007, before the outbreak of the financial crisis that caused the Great Recession.
In the EU as a whole, the volume of debt in the second quarter of 2022 was 13.11 trillion euros, up from 12.99 trillion in the previous quarter, which also represents a new all-time high in absolute values, although the ratio in relation to GDP stood at 86.4%, below the 87.5% of the first quarter.
"For both the euro area and the EU, the decrease in the public debt/GDP ratio is due to an increase in GDP that exceeds the increase in public debt in absolute terms," Eurostat explained.
Among the Twenty-seven, the highest levels of public debt over GDP at the end of the second quarter of 2022 were registered in Greece (182.1%), Italy (150.2%), Portugal (123.4%), Spain (116 .1%), France (113.1%) and Belgium (108.3%), while the lowest were observed in Estonia (16.7%), Bulgaria (21.3%) and Luxembourg (25.4 %).
Compared to the first quarter of 2022, three Member States recorded an increase in their debt-to-GDP ratio at the end of the second quarter of 2022 and 24 a decrease.
Increases in the debt/GDP ratio were observed in Luxembourg ( 2.8 percentage points), the Czech Republic ( 0.6 pp) and the Netherlands ( 0.1 pp), while the largest decreases were recorded in Cyprus (-6.8 pp). 8 pp), Greece (-6.3 pp), Croatia (-3.0 pp), Malta (-2.3 pp), Italy (-1.9 pp) and Ireland (-1.8 pp).
