Nigeria's External Debt Stock Stands At $38.391 Trillion – DMO

The Debt Management Office (DMO) reported that the country’s external debt stock rose to as high as $38,391 trillion for the year 2021.

The data shows that $18.66 billion, which represents 48.64 percent of the entire debt stock, was owed to multilateral agencies such as the World Bank Group, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the African Development Bank Group. 

The International Development Association is owed $11.97 billion of the total $18.66 billion owed to multilateral agencies, accounting for 64.17 percent of the country's external debt stock to Multilateral agencies.

Several projects are currently underway, ranging from skill acquisition programmes to infrastructure programmes in various parts of the country.

A clear example is the International Development Association's support for a federal government clean water project in Osun State.

The Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa and the Africa Growing Together Fund are the multilateral agencies with the least debt, with $5.88 billion and $4.72 billion owed to them, respectively, representing less than 0.057 percent of the total external debt stock of the multilateral agencies.

For our international trade partners, the country's total debt stock was 11.63 percent, with China owning the most, according to the report.

As of December 2021, our total debt obligation to China was $3.834 trillion. China's debt, which is managed by the EXIM Bank of China, dwarfs that of France, Japan, India, and Germany combined. China's debt accounts for more than 90% of our debts to international trade partners.

Our commercial bonds; such as Eurobonds and Diaspora bonds, accounted for exactly 38.21 percent of the country's external debt stock.

While our Eurobonds from various auctions totaled $14.368 trillion, accounting for more than 97.95 percent of our commercial bond debt, the diaspora bond, worth $300 million, accounted for the remaining 2.05 percent.

Finally, as of December 31, 2021, our external promissory notes, which are promises made by the country's government to foreign creditors to pay a certain amount of money in the future, stood at $600.64 million.