The IMF is worried about the world's $152 trillion debt pile

By Andrew Mayada
Bloomberg News
Wednesday, October 5, 2016

Eight years after the financial crisis, the world is suffering from a debt hangover of unprecedented proportions.

Gross debt in the non-financial sector has more than doubled in nominal terms since the turn of the century, reaching $152 trillion last year, and it's still rising, the International Monetary Fund said. The figure includes debt held by governments, non-financial firms, and households.

Current debt levels now sit at a record 225 percent of world gross domestic product, the IMF said today in its semi-annual Fiscal Monitor, noting that about two-thirds of the liabilities reside in the private sector. The rest of it is public debt, which has increased to 85 percent of GDP last year from below 70 percent.

Slow global growth is making it difficult to pay off the obligations, "setting the stage for a vicious feedback loop in which lower growth hampers deleveraging and the debt overhang exacerbates the slowdown," the Washington-based fund said. ...

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