Eurozone official public debt eases to 87.4% of GDP

(BRUSSELS) - Public sector debt across the eurozone edged down to 87.4 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in the third quarter of 2011, the European Union said on Monday.

The total amount of debt amassed by the 17 EU members of the currency area was 8.191 trillion euros ($10.676 trillion), a 25-billion-euro increase in absolute terms on the figure for the previous three months but a slight drop as a percentage of GDP, from 87.7 percent.

Germany was the biggest debtor, with 2.089 trillion euros outstanding at the end of September 2011, followed by Italy on 1.884 trillion and then France at 1.689.

There were no surprises among those with the highest debt-to-income ratios: Greece at 159.1 percent, Italy at 119.6 percent, Portugal 110.1 percent and Ireland 104.9 percent.

For the first time, the EU also published the volume of outstanding inter-governmental lending for the 17 eurozone states, which topped 70 billion euros or 0.8 percent of collective GDP.

For Germany and France, the two biggest contributors to the three bailouts to-date, for Greece, Ireland and Portugal, that came in at 0.7 percent and 0.6 percent of GDP respectively.