Sovereign debt has expanded across advanced and developing economies, while refinancing and interest costs have become increasingly important. OECD central-government borrowing reached USD 17 trillion in 2025, and global public debt was just under 94% of GDP in the IMF’s 2025 report. The figures below separate OECD, emerging-market, developing-country, and country-specific measures because debt totals are not directly interchangeable.
Contents
- OECD sovereign borrowing
- OECD debt stock and instruments
- Emerging-market sovereign debt
- Maturities and refinancing risk
- Debt service in developing countries
- Global and country debt measures
- United States federal debt composition
OECD sovereign borrowing
The OECD Global Debt Report 2025 describes a large and rising government borrowing market. OECD sovereign debt issuance reached nearly USD 16 trillion in 2024, compared with USD 14 trillion in 2023. It was projected to reach USD 17 trillion in 2025. The same series shows gross borrowing rising from USD 12 trillion in 2022 to over USD 14 trillion in 2023, nearly USD 16 trillion in 2024, and a projected USD 17 trillion in 2025.
Measured against economic output, OECD gross borrowing rose from 20% of GDP in 2022 to 22% in 2023. It was stabilizing at 24% of GDP in both 2024 and 2025. These are gross financing flows, so they include refinancing of maturing debt as well as borrowing that supports a net increase in debt.
Net borrowing gives a different view of the fiscal financing requirement. OECD net borrowing declined from nearly USD 4 trillion in 2023 to USD 3 trillion in 2024 and was projected to remain near USD 3 trillion in 2025. That projected 2025 level was about double the pre-pandemic average. Refinancing needs were expected to reach USD 13 trillion in 2025, equal to nearly 80% of gross borrowing.
The OECD Global Debt Report 2026 records a further rise in the subsequent outlook. Central-government borrowing in OECD countries reached USD 17 trillion in 2025 and was expected to rise by another USD 1 trillion in 2026. Outstanding sovereign bond debt stood at a record USD 61 trillion in that outlook, compared with USD 55 trillion in 2024.
| OECD measure | Earlier figure | Later or projected figure | Source label |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sovereign issuance | USD 14tn in 2023 | Nearly USD 16tn in 2024; USD 17tn projected for 2025 | OECD Global Debt Report 2025 |
| Net borrowing | Nearly USD 4tn in 2023 | USD 3tn in 2024 and projected for 2025 | OECD Global Debt Report 2025 |
| Outstanding sovereign bonds | USD 54tn in 2023 | Nearly USD 59tn projected for 2025 | OECD Global Debt Report 2025 |
| Central-government borrowing | USD 12tn in 2022 | USD 17tn in 2025; USD 18tn expected in 2026 | OECD Global Debt Report 2026 |
OECD debt stock and instruments
Outstanding sovereign bond debt in OECD countries was projected at nearly USD 59 trillion in 2025, up from USD 55 trillion in 2024 and USD 54 trillion in 2023. The OECD aggregate debt-to-GDP ratio rose from 82% in 2023 to 84% in 2024 and was projected to reach 85% in 2025. In the OECD Global Debt Report 2026 outlook, central-government debt was stable at 83% of GDP but projected to rise to 85% in 2026. That 2026 level was 39 percentage points higher than in 2007, before the global financial crisis.
Bond structure also changed. Fixed-rate bond issuance funded 87% of OECD net borrowing in 2024, up from 81% in 2023. However, the median contribution across issuers fell from 89% to 85% over the same period. Fixed-rate instruments represented 76% of outstanding OECD debt in 2024.
Inflation-linked bonds contributed about 2% of total net borrowing in 2024, versus a 10% average during 2011–20. They were projected to settle near 7% of outstanding OECD debt in 2024, below the pre-pandemic average of nearly 8%.
Short-term Treasury bills were more prominent. T-bills made up nearly 15% of outstanding OECD debt in 2024, the highest share since 2011 when 2020 is excluded. Their average share over the past decade was around 12%, compared with around 10% in 2015–19. Eleven OECD issuers increased their T-bill share of gross borrowing in 2024 compared with their original issuance plans, while ten adjusted overall issuance volumes. The number of issuers reporting year-to-year changes in original annual borrowing plans fell from 25 in 2022 to 20 in 2023 and 15 in 2024.
The OECD Global Debt Report 2026 also states that securities carrying an interest rate above 4% made up half of investment-grade bonds in OECD markets at the end of 2025, the first time that threshold had been reached since 2016.
Emerging-market sovereign debt
Emerging-market and developing-economy, or EMDE, sovereign bond debt reached nearly USD 12 trillion in 2024, up from less than USD 4 trillion in 2007, according to the OECD Global Debt Report 2025. The stock increased from about 20% of GDP in 2007 to around 30% of GDP in 2024. Annual EMDE sovereign issuance tripled over the same period, from roughly USD 1 trillion to over USD 3 trillion. In U.S. dollar terms, issuance grew at almost 7% annually from 2007 to 2024.
Credit quality across the stock was mixed. The investment-grade share of total outstanding EMDE sovereign debt reached nearly 80% in 2024, compared with less than half in 2007. At the same time, about half of rated EMDE sovereign issuers were graded high risk in 2024, and ten rated issuers were classified as very high risk or in default.
Currency and pricing matter when interpreting these totals. Around half of outstanding local-currency EMDE debt was issued in 2022–24, while only around one-third of outstanding U.S.-dollar-denominated EMDE debt was issued in that period. U.S.-dollar bond borrowing costs rose from around 4% in 2020 to over 6% in 2024, and exceeded 8% for lower non-investment-grade EMDEs in 2024.
Maturities and refinancing risk
More than USD 4.5 trillion of EMDE bond debt, about 40% of the total outstanding, was due to mature by 2027. More than 20% was due in 2025 alone. In low-income and high-risk EMDEs, more than half of bond debt was due by 2027, compared with nearly 40% across EMDEs as a whole. Around half of the debt of low-income and high-risk EMDEs was expected to mature during 2025–27.
Twenty-four EMDEs were expected to see more than half of their outstanding bond debt mature by 2027. Fifteen of those countries had credit ratings equivalent to high risk or lower at the end of 2024, and nine had debt-to-GDP ratios above 60%. In 23 of the 24 countries, over 80% of the debt maturing over the next three years was denominated in local currency. Average time to maturity was close to or below four years in all but Namibia.
The OECD Global Debt Report 2026 gives a broader maturity warning: more than a third of the outstanding bond stock in emerging markets was set to mature within three years, while more than half of low-income countries’ bonds were maturing over the same period.
U.S.-dollar debt presents a separate refinancing exposure. Around 20% of outstanding U.S.-dollar-denominated EMDE debt was set to mature by 2027, with the share above 25% for high-risk EMDEs. Secondary-market rates at the end of 2024 were around two percentage points above issuance yields for that dollar-denominated debt. For low- and middle-income-country debt maturing in 2026–27, interest-rate differentials were close to five percentage points, driven by Egypt and Pakistan.
Debt service in developing countries
The World Bank International Debt Report 2024 reported that developing countries spent a record USD 1.4 trillion servicing foreign debt in 2023. Interest payments surged nearly one-third to USD 406 billion. IDA-eligible countries paid USD 96.2 billion in debt service that year, including USD 61.6 billion in principal repayments and USD 34.6 billion in interest. The interest bill was four times the level of a decade earlier, while principal repayments fell nearly 8%.
The flow of financing differed by creditor group. Since 2022, private foreign creditors received nearly USD 13 billion more from IDA-eligible public borrowers in debt-service payments than they disbursed in new financing. Over the same period, the World Bank and other multilateral institutions supplied nearly USD 51 billion more in financing to IDA-eligible borrowers than they collected in debt-service payments.
External debt stocks also remained high. At the end of 2023, total external debt owed by all low- and middle-income countries reached a record USD 8.8 trillion, an 8% increase over 2020. IDA-eligible countries’ external debt rose to USD 1.1 trillion, nearly 18% above its 2020 level. The World Bank International Debt Report 2025 reported that the LMIC external-debt stock reached USD 8.9 trillion in 2024 after growth slowed to 1.1%.
That report also stated that developing countries paid USD 741 billion more in principal and interest on external debt between 2022 and 2024 than they received in new financing. The World Bank describes its International Debt Statistics database as the most comprehensive and transparent source of external debt data for developing countries.
Global and country debt measures
The IMF Global Debt Database covers 190 countries and reaches back to the 1950s. It includes public and private debt statistics for virtually the entire world, and its coverage expanded by ten countries, mostly low-income developing economies.
The IMF Fiscal Monitor 2026 reported global public debt at just under 94% of GDP in 2025 and projected it to reach 100% of GDP by 2029. That projection was one year earlier than the projection published in April 2025. The IMF Global Debt Database update reported U.S. general-government debt at 121% of GDP and China’s at 88% of GDP. Using a broader total-debt measure, the update put the United States at 143% of GDP and China at 206% of GDP. These measures cover different debt concepts, so the general-government and broader-total figures should not be treated as the same series.
United States federal debt composition
The U.S. Treasury’s Schedules of Federal Debt reported that, as of February 28, 2025, federal debt held by the public was USD 28,914,411 million. Marketable federal debt was USD 28,608,745 million, while nonmarketable federal debt was USD 305,666 million.
The marketable instruments included USD 6,367,075 million in Treasury bills, USD 14,730,528 million in Treasury notes, USD 4,877,984 million in Treasury bonds, USD 2,004,602 million in Treasury inflation-protected securities, and USD 628,556 million in floating-rate notes. The TIPS inflation-adjusted principal balance included USD 352,623 million attributable to inflation.
The U.S. Treasury Debt to the Penny dataset is updated at the end of each business day using the previous business day’s data. Its historical series begins on April 1, 1993; the cited snapshot ran through July 24, 2025. Treasury defines total public debt outstanding as debt held by the public plus intragovernmental holdings. Intragovernmental holdings are debt held by government trust funds, revolving funds, special funds, and Federal Financing Bank securities. These definitions explain why a federal-debt figure depends on whether the measure is public debt, marketable debt, or total public debt outstanding.