Primary surplus of 2016 to be eight times higher than planned

Last year’s primary surplus ranged between 3.8 and 4.1 percent of gross domestic product, Finance Ministry sources said ahead of the official announcement of the fiscal figures on Friday by the Hellenic Statistical Authority. The target had been for 0.5 percent of GDP.

The same sources argued that less than 1 billion euros or 0.5 percent of GDP concerned measures of a temporary nature.

On the contrary, the International Monetary Fund believes that some 2 percent of GDP, or 3.6 billion euros, of that primary surplus originated from temporary revenues and not from sustainable structural changes.