Public debt: decreased by €1 billion in the first quarter of 2024

The country’s public debt was reduced to 405.5 billion euros, for the first quarter of 2024, from 406.5 billion euros at the end of the previous year. Meanwhile, the Greek state’s cash reserves fell to 19.4 billion euros from 21.2 billion euros respectively.

At the general government level, public debt decreased at the end of the first quarter of this year to 356 billion euros, from 356.6 billion euros at the end of 2023. It is noteworthy that these available funds also include a so-called “solid cushion” (cash buffer) worth 15.7 billion euros. Of the total debt, only 26% is tradable on the secondary market, while the remaining 74% relates to interstate loans under memorandums of understanding.

Specifically, the Support Mechanism loans amount to 227 billion euros, while another 7.2 billion euros relate to private and cross-border loans. The amount of current guarantees granted by the Greek state remained unchanged at the end of the first quarter at 26.8 billion euros.

As can be seen from the public debt profile, €69.7 billion (17.2%) relate to bonds and notes bearing interest of up to one year. EUR 48.8 billion (12%) relate to bonds with a maturity of up to 5 years and 70.8% of the bonds, i.e. EUR 287 billion, relate to long-term bonds.

With these data, the Greek state will go to the markets on Wednesday, May 22, as part of the planned auctions, to reissue bonds, which will likely be announced tomorrow (5.21.2024).

Next week (29.05.2024), the Public Debt Management Organization (ODDIX) will begin the scheduled auction of bonds bearing interest for 26 weeks (six months). After that, the re-evaluation of creditworthiness by the international rating agency Fitch is awaited with interest, at the end of the month (5/31/2024).

It should be noted that the specific rating agency has rated the country’s creditworthiness as BBB, assessing the outlook for the Greek economy as “stable”.