Quarterly External Debt Statistics

** 2011 Q2 data are now available **

SDDS Country Data	GDDS Country Data
Country data	Country data
Cross country tables	Cross country tables
Database access	Database access

 

The Quarterly External Debt (QEDS) database, jointly developed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, brings together detailed external debt data of countries that subscribe to the IMF’s Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) and a selected number of countries that participate in the IMF’s General Data Dissemination System (GDDS). The benefit of bringing together comparable external debt data is to facilitate macroeconomic analysis and cross-country data comparison.  

 

The participation of countries in this centralized database is voluntary. Currently, sixty-two countries have agreed to participate in the SDDS/QEDS database and forty-four Low-Income Countries (LICs) to provide data to the GDDS/QEDS database. Other countries may be asked to participate on the centralized database at a later stage. The database is updated quarterly and within one month of the end of a quarter. These databases aim to support countries' efforts toward improving the coverage and availability of external debt data.

 

The QEDS database includes country and cross-country tables, and enables users to query and extract data, by country, group of countries, and specific external debt components. The QEDS database is linked to metadata on external debt for individual countries maintained by the IMF.

 

The QEDS database is a collaborative undertaking of the World Bank and the IMF, and it is part of an ongoing effort to improve the transparency, timeliness, and availability of external debt statistics. The database has been endorsed by the Inter-Agency Task Force on Finance Statistics (TFFS) that produced the External Debt Statistics: Guide for Compilers and Users.

 

Please see data release calendar here.

 

In the aftermath of the 1994-95 international financial crisis, the IMF established a two-tier standard to guide IMF member countries in the provision of economic and financial data to the public, namely the Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) and the General Data Dissemination System (GDDS). Participation in both data initiatives is voluntary. The purpose of the SDDS is to guide countries in the provision to the public of comprehensive, timely, accessible, and reliable economic and financial statistics. By subscribing to the SDDS, members undertake to provide the supporting information to the IMF and to observe the various elements of the SDDS. The GDDS is a structured process focused on data quality that assists countries in adapting their statistical systems to meet the evolving requirements of the user community in the areas of economic management and development. Participating countries commit to adhere to sound statistical practices in developing their statistical systems.

 

On March 29, 2000, the IMF included a separate total external debt data category in the SDDS and public and publicly-guaranteed external debt and a debt-service schedule as a core data category in the GDDS.

 

via web.worldbank.org