ZAGREB, 3 Jan 2022 - The Croatian National Bank (HNB) has recently published figures about the country's debt, showing that the total debt amounted to HRK 344.7 billion at the end of September 2021.

"Measured against the annual GDP, the total debt amounted to 82.4% of GDP at the end of September 2021, and 84.7% of GDP at the end of September 2020, which is a decrease of 2.3 percentage points on an annual level, but also a decrease of 3.7 percentage points over the previous quarter, when this share was 86.1%."

According to final data provided by the central bank, "the total consolidated debt of all general government sub-sectors reached HRK 344.7bn at the end of September 2021, up HRK 3.9bn (or 1.1%) since the end of June 2021 and up by HRK 18.7bn (or 5.7%) since the end of September 2020."

The annual debt growth was due to an increase in the domestic debt by HRK 7.9bn (or 3.6%) and in the external debt by HRK 10.8bn (or 10.2%). Comparing the developments between the two quarters, domestic debt grew by HRK 6.3bn (or 2.9%), while external debt shrunk by HRK 2.5bn (or 2.1%) from the last quarter.

The HNB notes that although the general government debt rose, a significant increase in Gross Domestic Product over the recent months has led to the narrowing of the general government debt to GDP ratio.

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