Total External Debt

Total External Debt measures the stock of outstanding debt owed by residents of a country to nonresidents, covering both the public and private sectors. It includes loans, bonds and other financial liabilities denominated in foreign or domestic currency whenever the creditors are abroad, reflecting the economy's overall external borrowing obligations and its exposure to foreign financial risks; the precise definition may vary by country. Published in the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Latin Macro Watch (LMW), it supports researchers, policymakers and analysts studying external vulnerability across Latin America and the Caribbean.

Coverage

Total External Debt is available for 19 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean at annual, monthly and quarterly frequency, spanning 1990 to 2026. Values can be expressed as a share of GDP, of total exports or of total imports, in millions of USD, and on a fiscal-year (Q4–Q3 aggregation) basis, in end-of-period and period-average variants. Transformations include MA3, MA6 and MA12 moving averages and MoM %, QoQ % and YoY % growth rates.

Sources

The series is compiled from national central banks, statistical agencies and finance authorities, including Banco Central do Brasil, Banco de Mexico (Banxico), Banco de la República de Colombia, INDEC - Argentina and INEC - Panamá.

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Format	CSV
Language	en
Country	Argentina Bahamas Trinidad & Tobago Belize Costa Rica Dominican Republic Ecuador Bolivia Brazil Chile Colombia El Salvador Jamaica Mexico Nicaragua Guatemala Guyana Haiti Honduras Panama Uruguay Venezuela Barbados Paraguay Peru Suriname
Data notes	What does Total External Debt measure? It measures the stock of outstanding debt owed by residents to nonresidents, covering both the public and private sectors, including loans, bonds and other financial liabilities held by creditors abroad. How many countries and which time period are covered? The indicator covers 19 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean from 1990 to 2026, at annual, monthly and quarterly frequency. What units and transformations are available? Values are available as a share of GDP, of total exports or of total imports, in millions of USD and on a fiscal-year (Q4–Q3) basis, with MA3/MA6/MA12 moving averages and MoM %, QoQ % and YoY % growth rates. Where does the data come from? The data is compiled from national central banks, statistical agencies and finance authorities, including Banco Central do Brasil, Banco de Mexico (Banxico), INDEC - Argentina and INEC - Panamá. Does the definition vary by country? Yes. The precise coverage may vary by country; for example, for Argentina it corresponds to the gross external debt reported in Table 24 of INDEC, spanning general government, the central bank, deposit-taking and other corporations, households and NPISHs. How do I cite this indicator? Cite it as: Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Latin Macro Watch — "Total External Debt". data.iadb.org/dataset/latin-macro-watch-dataset.