BTPs: foreign demand continues – record purchases of 38.7 billion in June

There is absolutely no sign of the ‘honeymoon’ period – which has now lasted for more than three years – between Italian government bonds and international investors coming to an end. Indeed, the latest figures released yesterday by the Bank of Italia show that in June, net cross-border purchases totalled 38.7 billion euros – the highest monthly figure recorded since the 1990s.

This brings the increase in the exposure of non-residents to 83.4 billion compared with the start of the year and, more significantly, the overall growth in this figure to 356 billion since April 2023: the real turning point following a prolonged period of disinterest in our BTps, and from which point the increase in foreign portfolios invested in Italian public sector debt as a whole has exceeded 400 billion to reach 1,140 billion, as the Bank of Italia noted last week.

Extending the analysis beyond the data on government bonds, the balance of payments figures for June also show foreign purchases of debt securities issued by banks (worth 10 billion, with 16.7 billion due in 2026) and other companies (9.2 billion and 15.1 billion since the start of the year), thereby complementing the trend outlined above. The Bank of Italy also reports that direct investment in Italia has risen, albeit to a lesser extent (5.4 billion), whilst, again in June, the foreign assets of Italian residents increased by 27.9 billion. In this case, the increase affected almost all components, in particular other investments (12.7 billion), portfolio investments (10.1 billion), direct investments abroad (5.6 billion) and official reserves (0.8 billion).

Still with reference to last June, the current account of the Italian balance of payments showed a surplus of 5.8 billion euros, down slightly from the 6.6 billion recorded in the same month of 2025. In the 12 months ending in June 2026, however, the current account surplus showed a marked improvement, rising to €30.4 billion from the €20.7 billion recorded in the same period of the previous year: a figure which, in this case, represents 1.3 per cent of national GDP. This improvement was driven by an increase in the goods surplus (54.6 billion, up from 47.7) and the return to a surplus in the primary income component (4.0 billion, up from -2.5). The Bank of Italia, however, reports that the deficit in services (-8.0 billion, down from -5.7) and that in secondary income (-20.2 billion, down from -18.8) have worsened.