## Spanish Recovery: Key Numbers

_IMF News, October 6, 2017_

## Source details

**Canonical URL:** [Spanish Recovery: Key Numbers](https://www.imf.org/en/news/articles/2017/10/04/na100617-spanish-recovery-key-numbers)

## Other formats

- [Markdown version](/en/news/articles/2017/10/04/na100617-spanish-recovery-key-numbers/index.md)
- [Structured JSON version](/en/news/articles/2017/10/04/na100617-spanish-recovery-key-numbers/index.json)
- [Bundle manifest](/en/news/articles/2017/10/04/na100617-spanish-recovery-key-numbers/bundle-manifest.json)

## Bibliographic details
- Published: October 6, 2017

---

### Overview
- Spain has been a success story as crisis recoveries go; the economy expanded for the fourth year in a row and “took the right reforms” after the 2008 slump.
- Despite healthy growth and regained competitiveness, major challenges remain: high unemployment, low productivity, and high net indebtedness to foreign creditors.

### Growth and GDP
- 3.3% — Spain’s GDP finally surpassed its pre-crisis level in the first half of 2017.
- 3.3% — Growth in 2016; Spain grew nearly twice as fast as the euro area average.
- Recovery drivers: consumption, investment, and exports.

### External Position / Current Account
- 1.9% — Spain moved from a large current account deficit of 9.6 percent of GDP in 2007 to four consecutive years of surplus, reaching nearly 2 percent of GDP in 2016.
- Contributing factors: strong exports including services, a lower energy trade deficit due to low oil prices, and lower interest payments.

### Fiscal Balance and Public Debt
- 4.5% — General budget deficit in 2016.
- Fiscal trajectory: deficit is on track to slide under the 3-percent threshold set by the European Union by 2018, enabling exit from the EU’s excessive deficit procedure that has been in place since 2009.
- 99.4% — Government debt ratio is nearly 100 percent of GDP, almost three times higher than on the eve of the financial crisis.
- Policy recommendation: IMF recommends reforms primarily to the tax system to increase revenues, which could serve as a cushion in harder times.

### Unemployment and Labor Market Challenges
- 17.2% — Unemployment rate (current), down 10 percentage points from its 2013 peak.
- 3.9 million — Number of Spaniards without jobs.
- Distributional concerns: situation especially dire for low-skilled youths and those out of work for longer than a year.
- Policy recommendations: strengthen, better target, and coordinate job search assistance and labor market programs such as training.

### Employment Composition and Job Quality
- 25% — Share of all euro area jobs created over the past year that were in Spain, aided by wage moderation and labor market reforms.
- 79% — Share of Spaniards working in the service sector.
- Job quality issue: just over half of the new jobs are temporary, which tend to be less productive and leave workers in uncertainty.
- Policy recommendation: reduce costs associated with open-ended job contracts.

### Banking Sector and Nonperforming Loans
- 8.4% — Ratio of nonperforming loans for bank operations in Spain.
- 5.5% — Ratio of nonperforming loans when Spain’s banks’ extensive foreign business is taken into consideration.
- Policy recommendation: banks should accelerate balance sheet clean-up to become more resilient to shocks and to facilitate the provision of new credit to the economy.

*IMF Country Focus — Spanish Recovery: Key Numbers, October 6, 2017*

---


## References

- [https://www.imf.org/en/News/country-focus](https://www.imf.org/en/News/country-focus)
- [PRESS CENTER](http://presscenter.imf.org/)
- [IMF Country Focus](https://www.imf.org/en/news/country-focus)
- [Read the report](http://www.imf.org/en/Publications/CR/Issues/2017/10/06/Spain-2017-Article-IV-Consultation-Press-Release-Staff-Report-and-Statement-by-the-Executive-45319)
- [Read the financial assessment](http://www.imf.org/en/Publications/CR/Issues/2017/10/06/Spain-Financial-System-Stability-Assessment-45321)
- [Spain and the IMF](https://www.imf.org/external/country/esp/)
- [https://www.imf.org/en/home](https://www.imf.org/en/home)

_Source: https://www.imf.org/en/news/articles/2017/10/04/na100617-spanish-recovery-key-numbers_