Dublin, Sept. 20, 2026 (Lusa) - The government forecasts that Portugal's public finances will continue to show a «small surplus» in 2027, though it will be lower than the 0.7% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) surplus achieved in 2025, the finance minister told Lusa.
«We continue to say that this year we will have a positive budget balance, relatively close to zero, and next year we will continue to have a surplus. When I say ‘modest', [it means] it will be lower than 0.7% of GDP, as we had in 2025; it will be lower,» said Joaquim Miranda Sarmento in an interview with the Lusa news agency on the sidelines of the informal meeting of Economic and Financial Affairs ministers (Ecofin) in Dublin.
On Friday, the minister told Lusa that the public accounts were expected to end 2026 with a budget surplus «close to 0».
Miranda Sarmento emphasised that the government's policy is to maintain «small surpluses» rather than to seek high budget surpluses.
«This year, 2026, given the turmoil, given the situation with Iran, we are very close to 0, but still in positive territory. Next year we will return to what has always been our policy: a small surplus,» he said.
The minister added that the figure will be known in October, when the draft State Budget for 2027 is presented.
The government's forecast for 2027 contrasts, however, with the projections of some institutions, such as the European Commission, which forecasts a deficit of 0.4% of GDP in 2027, following a deficit of 0.1% this year, according to forecasts published in May.
The Public Finance Council also anticipates a deficit of 0.4% of gross domestic product in 2027, expecting the budget balance to return to negative territory from that year onward.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF), for its part, projects a figure closer to the government's forecast, pointing in the scenario published in October to a general government balance of 0.0% of GDP in 2027.
The IMF is the only institution that expects a balanced budget next year and anticipates a small deficit only in 2028.
However, public finances remain uncertain due to energy prices and the economic effects of the war in the Middle East.
In an interview with Lusa, Miranda Sarmento highlighted rising fuel and gas prices, as well as the possibility of supply shortages, as factors that make the final quarter of 2026 and the forthcoming budgetary period «more challenging».
However, according to the minister, only an extreme situation would prevent the 2026 public accounts from ending with a surplus.
At European Union level, the minister advocated «budgetary discipline», although he acknowledged the possibility of resorting to common European debt to finance «transformative projects» in the areas of competitiveness and defence.
Just over a week after the European Commission presented the first EU law on affordable housing, focused on regulating short-term accommodation and boosting supply, the finance minister told Lusa that this has been «a government priority from day one» of its term.
Listing the measures adopted, such as the construction of homes under the Recovery and Resilience Plan, the reduction in VAT on construction, the lowering of property income tax on certain residential tenancy agreements, the simplification of procedures and eviction rules, and amendments to the land law – Joaquim Miranda Sarmento stated that, in the housing sector, the Government «has already pulled out all the stops».
The minister said that the rise in house prices «is slowing down», but acknowledged that, as this is a «structural problem», it will «take time for results to emerge».
ANE/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
