Italy’s enormous debt pile continues to grow

16 May, 2021 10:22 / Updated 4 years ago

Italy’s sovereign debt has reached a new all-time high of more than €2.65 trillion, according to the Bank of Italy, which reported a massive month-over-month increase of €6.9 billion in March alone.

The upsurge reportedly came as the debt of the central government increased by €7.7 billion. At the same time, the debt of the local government decreased by €0.8 billion, while that of the social security institution reportedly remained almost unchanged.

The regulator also said that the borrowing requirement amounted to €25.3 billion, more than offsetting the reduction in the Treasury’s liquidity.

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As of the end of March, the share of debt held by the Bank of Italy stood at 22.2%, up 0.4% from the previous month, with the average residual life of the debt increasing slightly to 7.4 years.

Italy’s debt is currently around 160% of economic output.

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