Public debt in the euro zone fell, in the third quarter of 2022, to 93.0% of GDP and in the European Union (EU) to 85.1%, according to data released this Monday by Eurostat.
In the euro zone, public debt fell to 93.0% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) compared to 97.3% registered in the third quarter of 2021 and 94.2% between April and June 2022.
In the EU, the debt/GDP ratio decreased in the quarterly (86.4%) and year-on-year (89.7%) comparison. Between July and September 2022, Portugal maintained the third largest public debt in the EU (120.1%), after Greece (178.2%) and Italy (147.3%), while Estonia (15.8%) ), Bulgaria (23.1%) and Luxembourg (24.6%) had the lowest debts in the third quarter of 2022.
Public debt fell in 23 Member States, especially in Greece, where it fell 5.3 percentage points (pp), Cyprus (-3.8 pp), Portugal (-3.3 pp), Italy (-3.0 pp ) and Croatia (- 2.8 pp.).
Bulgaria (1.9 pp), the Czech Republic (1.7 pp), France (0.3 pp) and Sweden (0.2 pp) were the Member States that saw public debt increase, relative to GDP.
According to the EU statistics service, both in the euro area and in the 27 Member States as a whole, the decline in the weight of public debt is due to GDP growth.
Source: TSF
