Download
Download of debt statistics incl. gross borrowing requirements, repayments and interest
Definition
The long-term time series published here on debt levels, gross borrowing requirements, interest, redemptions and outstanding volume (including own holdings) refer to Federal securities or borrowing by the Federal government. As central government debt statistics, they only represent a part of the general government debt statistics. In addition to the Federal government, total government debt in the general government budget also includes the Länder, municipalities and municipal associations as well as social security funds, including all extra-budgetary funds. In the national accounts, the sum of all these levels is the starting point for calculating the Maastricht debt level, which is used for international comparisons of government debt ratios.
Federal borrowing is used to finance the federal budget and its special funds as well as to take out loans for the FMS and ESF, which are passed on to institutions under public law (loan financing). All time series are available for download with disaggregated data. All figures are presented in Euro.
Since the beginning of 2025, the economic amount of interest expenditure has been the starting point for their presentation in the federal budget when borrowing via Federal securities: the total interest costs incurred by a debt issuance are estimated and posted on an accrual basis, i.e. essentially evenly spread over the payment dates: On the value date of the issuance, the cash-effective issuance proceeds are recognized in full as borrowing proceed. In the result, agios and disagios are now taken into account annually on a pro-rata basis over the entire term of the bond.
This new methodology is transparently reflected in two additional tabs, ‘_3’ and ‘_4’ for gross borrowing requirements and ‘_7’ and ‘_8’ for interest expenses in the Excel downloads. They supplement the previous tabs for gross borrowing requirements (‘_2’) and the cash interest expenses (‘_6’), which will continue to be reported in accordance with the previous reporting and accounting logic.