Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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263. To ask the Minister for Finance the ratio of private sector indebtedness as a share of GNI since 2015, as defined as part of the European Commission’s macroeconomic imbalances procedure, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [65552/25]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Table 1 sets out the latest data from Eurostat on Irish private sector debt since 2015. The most recent iteration of the European Commission’s macroeconomic imbalances procedure (MIP) scoreboard provides a breakdown of private sector debt including household debt and non-financial corporate (NFC) debt (both as a share of GDP).

It should be noted that NFC debt includes intra-company liabilities of large multinational enterprises operating in Ireland. For this reason GDP is likely a more appropriate denominator for ratio analysis of NFC debt. On this basis, while still relatively elevated, NFC debt has declined very significantly from over 250 per cent of GDP in 2015 to 91 per cent last year.

Table 1 also shows private sector debt as a share of GNI and modified GNI (GNI*) over the past decade. GNI* is the preferred metric for the size of the Irish economy and for ‘ratio analysis’ of more domestically-oriented indicators such as household debt, as it strips out the main globalisation-related distortions from Irish GDP. Household debt as a share of GNI* has fallen significantly over the last decade reflecting continued deleveraging as well as very strong growth in the domestic economy.

Table 1: Private sector indebtedness