Both billionaires and debtors are subject to research by various rating agencies. The former is mainly compiled for curiosity whereas the latter is made by central banks to help investors evaluate the credit worthiness of countries. The European Central Bank unveiled a fresh rating of the EU countries in terms of their sovereign debt. From now on, the European regulator is going to group the 28 countries by their gravity in the eurozone’s economy.
The ranks come as no surprise even for amateurs in economics. The three leaders in the nomination for the biggest public debt represent Greece, Italy, and Portugal. These countries have the heaviest sovereign debt relative to their GDP. Greece has been the worst debtor for a few years in a row. Its government debt is 178.6% of GDP. The second rank is given to Italy with the public debt of 131.8% of GDP. Portugal is ranked third as it has run up the government debt of 125.7% of GDP. Estonia closes the rating as it has the smallest public debt of 9% among other EU countries.
On the whole, the ratio of the sovereign debt of all EU countries to their GDP contracted to 81.6% in 2017 compared to 83.3% in 2016. Interestingly, despite its ailing economy Russia is among the leaders in the worldwide rating of the countries with the smallest public debt.
