The projected outstanding public debt figure for 2014 will not now be 99.8% as announced earlier this week in the draft budget, but will be 98.9% after the discovery of a €10 billion ‘error’.
The State Budget for 2014 has two volumes, a ‘yellow book’ summarising the public debt and a ‘green book’ with the details of that debt. The green book apparently added up to the correct figure but the yellow book didn’t, by €10 billion.
The last time the Spanish public debt exceeded 100% of GDP was in 1909. It is expected to do so again in 2015.
During the presentation of the budget earlier this week, Finance Minister Cristóbal Montoro admitted he was “worried” about the size of Spain’s debt, but added that servicing that debt is becoming increasingly easier.