Praia, Oct. 6, 2026 (Lusa) - Cabo Verde reduced its debt-to-Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ratio in the second quarter compared with the previous year, according to the Ministry of Finance's latest statistical bulletin, which Lusa saw on Tuesday.
Central government debt fell to 93.1% of GDP in the second quarter, down 6.8 percentage points from a year earlier.
The total stock stands at 101% of GDP when including guaranteed debt from the state-owned enterprise sector (SEE), yet this still represents a fall of six percentage points compared with 2025.
In practice, the relative share has decreased, even though the nominal value of the overall debt stock rose to 329.4 billion escudos (around €2.9 billion), up 3%.
The reduction in the debt-to-GDP ratio coincides with the increase in GDP as estimated by the Ministry of Finance, from 299.1 billion escudos (€2.7 billion) in 2025 to 326.1 billion (€2.9 billion) this year.
In the same period of 2024, the debt stood at 302.1 billion escudos (€2.7 billion) and represented 109.2% of GDP (133% when taking the EEA into account).
External debt remained virtually unchanged in nominal terms, at 200.7 billion escudos (€1.8 billion), but its share of GDP fell from 67.1% to 61.6% over the year.
Domestic debt, meanwhile, rose by 4.9%, from 98.2 billion escudos (€891 million) to 103 billion escudos (€934 million), whilst its share of GDP fell from 32.8% to 31.6%.
As regards external debt, multilateral creditors accounted for 65% of the total at the end of June.
The guaranteed financial debt of public enterprises rose from 21.2 to 25.7 billion escudos (from €192 million to €233 million), rising from 7.1% to 7.9% of GDP.
The Ministry of Finance notes that, in the case of SEE companies, the figures cover only guaranteed financial debt, as the unguaranteed component is not yet available.
Total debt servicing by the central government amounted to 18.5 billion escudos (€168 million) in the second quarter, down from the 18.8 billion (€170 million) recorded a year earlier.
LFO/ADB // ADB.
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