General Government Balance and Debt under the Maastricht Treaty: Second reporting for 2024
- In 2023, the General Government sector registered a deficit of €938.9 million, equivalent to 4.5 per cent of GDP.
- The debt in 2023 increased by €780.5 million over the previous year, amounting to €9,791.4 million or 47.4 per cent of GDP.
- Adjustments are made to shift from the Consolidated Fund deficit of €808.0 million, to an accrual-based General Government sector deficit of €938.9 million.
General Government Balance and Debt under the Maastricht Treaty: Second reporting for 2024
General Government Balance and Debt under the Maastricht Treaty: Second reporting for 2024
General Government balance and debt position
The deficit of General Government for 2023 amounted to €938.9 million, an improvement of €15.5 million over the deficit recorded in the previous year. The balance is calculated as the difference between total revenue (€6,561.3 million) and expenditure (€7,500.2 million) of General Government. When comparing 2023 to 2022, total revenue increased by €626.1 million, while total expenditure increased by €610.5 million.
Table 1. Main Aggregates
| 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | ||
| General Government revenue | € millions | 4,790,124 | 5,420,657 | 5,935,220 | 6,561,295 |
| % of GDP | 33.4 | 32.5 | 32.5 | 31.8 | |
| General Government expenditure | € millions | 6,042,783 | 6,580,998 | 6,889,675 | 7,500,213 |
| % of GDP | 42.1 | 39.5 | 37.8 | 36.3 | |
| General Government surplus (+) / deficit (-) | € millions | -1,252,659 | -1,160,342 | -954,455 | -938,918 |
| % of GDP | -8.7 | -7.0 | -5.2 | -4.5 | |
| General Government debt | € millions | 6,982,741 | 8,272,962 | 9,010,899 | 9,791,394 |
| % of GDP | 48.7 | 49.6 | 49.4 | 47.4 | |
When measured as a percentage of GDP, the General Government balance was equivalent to a deficit of 4.5 per cent, an improvement of 0.7 percentage points when compared to a deficit of 5.2 per cent registered in 2022.
Chart 1. General Government balance as a % of GDP
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General Government debt increased by €780.5 million over 2022 and stood at €9,791.4 million. The debt-to-GDP ratio for 2023 was down to 47.4 per cent from 49.4 per cent in 2022 (Table 1).
Chart 2. General Government debt as a % of GDP
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2023 data
To reach the General Government sector’s negative balance of €938.9 million for 2023, several adjustments were made to the balance of the Government’s Consolidated Fund, which registered a deficit of €808.0 million, as reported in NSO news release 059/2024. These adjustments are necessary to transition from the Government’s Consolidated Fund to an accrual-based accounting approach, in line with European methodology. Additionally, the adjustments account for Extra Budgetary Units1 (EBUs), classified within the General Government sector, as well as the Local Government sector. Table 3 explains the transition from the Consolidated Fund to General Government sector.
The largest negative adjustment was related to Other accounts receivable and payable which amounted to €402.0 million. This includes, amongst other items, the Treasury Department’s accruals data, adjustments for the EU Funds neutralisation, and the COVID-19 tax deferrals. Other negative adjustments were the Treasury Clearance Funds (TCF) in non-financial transactions (€11.8 million), rerouted transactions inside the General Government sector and public-private partnership (PPP) agreements (€8.9 million), and the recording for payable tax credits (€6.1 million).
The main positive adjustments included time-adjusted cash transactions (€160.7 million) and an increased surplus recorded by the EBUs, which reached €119.7 million, an increase of €32.5 million when compared to 2022. Other increases were the difference between interest paid and accrued (€10.6 million), interest received from the sinking fund (€5.8 million) and the aggregated surplus from Local Government of €0.6 million.
Reporting and updates
On 30 September 2024, Malta submitted the government deficit and debt levels for the years 2020-2023, as part of the Excessive Deficit Procedure (EDP) Notification. This was done in accordance with Council Regulation (EC) No. 479/2009, as amended by Commission Regulation (EU) No. 220/2014.
When compared to the previous submission of 28 March 2024, the deficit of the General Government was revised down for all the years under review, with the main revisions being in 2023 (-€11.5m), 2022 (-€10.3m) and 2021 (-€5.6m). The main revision was due to updated data relating to the payable tax credits, in 2022 (-€8.7m) and in 2023 (-€14.4m).
Additionally, the availability of audited financial statements for EBUs and local councils resulted in a combined downward revision of the fiscal balance, amounting to €0.8 million in 2020, €5.8 million in 2021, €1.8 million in 2022, and €0.1 million in 2023.
The revisions in General Government debt were due to the inclusion of the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) deferral interest, as along with the availability of audited accounts for EBUs and local councils. As a result, the debt figures were revised upwards by €8.7 million for 2020 and €9.7 million for 2021, with more significant revisions of €11.2 million and €23.6 million for 2022 and 2023, respectively.
Stock-Flow Adjustment
The Stock Flow Adjustment (SFA), also known as the deficit-debt adjustment, captures transactions or factors that affect government debt but are not reflected in the fiscal balance. In 2023, a SFA of -0.8 per cent of GDP was recorded. This indicates that the deficit of 4.5 per cent of GDP increased more than implied by the change in government debt, which was 3.8 per cent of GDP. The negative SFA was primarily driven by decreases in Other accounts receivable and payable (2.6 per cent of GDP) and Loans (0.3 per cent of GDP). These decreases were partly offset by increases in the holdings of Currency and deposits (1.7 per cent of GDP), Equity and investment fund shares (0.2 per cent of GDP) and Debt securities (0.2 per cent of GDP) (Table 4).
Further information
The data in this release is presented on an accrual basis, as opposed to the monthly news release on government finances, which reflects the Government’s Consolidated Fund and is presented on a cash basis. This adheres to the guidelines outlined in the Manual on Government Deficit and Debt and the European System of Accounts (ESA) 2010 (2023 edition). It covers the General Government sector, comprising the Local Government, Extra Budgetary Units, and Budgetary Central Government. Additionally, other government accounts, such as the Treasury Clearance Fund and the Sinking Fund, alongside the Consolidated Fund, are included. Financial transactions are excluded, and other accrual adjustments are factored in.
The official EDP notification tables that were transmitted to the EU Commission can be found in the excel tables.
Further data for the Government’s Consolidated Fund can be found online.
More information on the revenue and expenditure categories, as well as the financial assets and liabilities and debt, was published today in the News Release Quarterly Accounts for the General Government Sector: Q2/2024.
The EDP Consolidated Inventory of Sources and Methods in ESA 2010 is available on the NSO website.
1 A list at the end of this news release shows the EBUs which formed part of the General Government sector as at 31 December 2023.
