Product (GDP) in June, the lowest value since March 2011, when Portugal was under pressure from the markets and a month before the announcement of the request for international financial assistance.

In absolute terms, public debt stabilised at 280.1 billion euros in June, corresponding to an increase of just 100 million compared to the previous month, according to data released by the Bank of Portugal. Compared to December last year, there was a significant jump of 7.5 billion, reflecting the rush of families to obtain Savings Certificates. An upward trajectory that will be corrected in October, when Portugal has to return a check of 9.4 billion to investors, related to a line of Treasury bonds that expires in that month.

Even so, the strength of the economy in the first half of the year helped to lower the weight of public debt in relation to GDP to a minimum of more than 12 years, although absolute public debt remained close to the historical maximum of 280.4 thousand million, observed in May last year.

On the other hand, in relation to the peak of 138.2% of GDP reached in March 2021, in the middle of the pandemic, it has already dropped by 27 percentage points and the Government's perspectives point to it continuing to fall in the coming years.

In an interview with Jornal de Negócios and Antena 1, the Secretary of State for Finance, João Nuno Mendes, revealed that he should lower the threshold of 100% next year, taking Portugal out of the group of the most indebted economies in the Eurozone. Moreover, in the first quarter of the year, Portugal registered the third-largest fall in public debt and was close to Spain and France.