Exactly one year ago, in its Global Financial Stability report, the IMF issued a stark warning when looking at the soaring level of private sector debt: it found that more than 20% of U.S. corporations are at risk of defaults once interest rates rise, and calculated that the combined assets of firms threatened by default – those who earnings do not cover their interest expense – could reach almost $4 trillion.
Fast forward exactly one year to today, when the IMF once again sounded the alarm on debt, only this time on the public side of the ledger, warning about – what else – excessive global borrowing, and noting that with a total of $164 trillion of debt, or 225% of global debt to GDP…
… the world’s public and private sectors are more in debt now than at the peak of the 2008 financial crisis, when global debt/GDP peaked at 213%.
Some more details from the IMF: while advanced economies are responsible for most global debt, in the last ten years, emerging market economies have been responsible for most of the increase. In fact, as we showed several months ago, China alone contributed 43% to the increase in total global debt since 2007. In contrast, the contribution from low income developing countries is barely noticeable…