Türkiye swings to primary budget surplus in 2025

Türkiye's general government ran an estimated primary budget surplus of approximately 1.65% of GDP in 2025.

This is according to the data released by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) on October 1, compared with an estimated primary deficit of 1.13% of GDP in 2024.

TÜİK reported that Türkiye's general government deficit narrowed to 600.4 billion lira ($12.33 billion) in 2025, equivalent to 0.9% of GDP, from 3.4% of GDP in 2024. The agency said social security funds and local government ran surpluses in 2025, while the central government recorded a deficit.

Interest expenditure rose to 2.406 trillion lira ($49.41 billion) in 2025 from 1.688 trillion lira ($34.65 billion) in 2024, while interest income increased to 761.2 billion lira ($15.63 billion) from 651 billion lira ($13.37 billion).

Subtracting interest income from interest expenditure puts Türkiye's net interest cost at approximately 1.65 trillion lira ($33.78 billion) in 2025, up 58.7% from an estimated 1.04 trillion lira ($21.29 billion) in 2024. This was equivalent to an increase from approximately 2.32% of GDP to 2.60% of GDP.

Adding this net interest cost back to the headline deficit figure, Trend's calculations show that the primary balance - the budget position excluding interest payments - moved from a deficit of approximately 1.13% of GDP in 2024 to a surplus of approximately 1.65% of GDP, or roughly 1.04 trillion lira ($21.45 billion), in 2025.

This represented an improvement of approximately 2.78 percentage points of GDP, compared with a 2.5-percentage-point improvement in the headline overall balance.

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