Serbia Borrows 5.2 Billion Euros, Mostly for Rafale Jets
Serbia's draft final budget account breaks down last year's borrowing: the biggest contract, 1.92 billion euros, went to Rafale jets, as banks rose to third among creditors in five years.
The draft Law on the 2025 Budget Final Account, submitted to the National Assembly, breaks down the state’s borrowing from last year contract by contract for the first time: a total of 5.2 billion euros, of which the largest single deal, 1.92 billion euros, went toward buying French Rafale fighter jets.
The figure covers foreign and domestic loans confirmed through 22 separate laws: 18 for foreign debt and four for loans from banks operating in Serbia. Most of it, 4.65 billion euros, was borrowed abroad. An additional 70 billion dinars, roughly 600 million euros at the 2025 average exchange rate, was borrowed from four domestic banks. Add the guarantees the state extended to state owned companies, and the new liability grows by another 495 to 500 million euros.
Where the Money Went
The Rafale jet contract was signed in May 2025 with a consortium of French banks, and on its own accounts for more than a third of all foreign borrowing that year. The second largest loan came from the European Union: 1.13 billion euros for a Western Balkans growth and reform program, agreed at the end of 2024 and ratified last year.
Next is the European Investment Bank, which lent 357 million euros for clinical centers, the railway line from Nis to Dimitrovgrad and green financing, while the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development approved 272 million euros for tax administration reform and education. The Moravian Corridor drew 260 million euros from a bank consortium led by America’s JPMorgan. Other creditors on the list include the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Germany’s KfW and the French Development Agency, mostly for sector wide reforms rather than single projects.
On the domestic market, the money went almost entirely into roads. Banca Intesa lent 12 billion dinars and UniCredit Bank eight billion dinars, both for the Ruma to Sabac to Loznica road section. OTP Bank provided 15 billion dinars for part of the Danube highway between Pozarevac and Golubac, while NLB Komercijalna Bank issued the largest single domestic loan, 35 billion dinars, for the highway running from Belgrade through Zrenjanin to Novi Sad. All of these loans are denominated in dinars with a currency clause.
Who Are Serbia’s Biggest Creditors?
The public debt data also shows a shift in who Serbia owes money to. Debt owed to commercial banks climbed over five years from 700 million euros to 5.3 billion euros, its level in mid 2026. Back in June 2022, commercial banks ranked tenth among Serbia’s creditors, behind buyers of dinar and eurobonds, the International Monetary Fund, the European Investment Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and foreign governments. By the middle of this year, banks had climbed to third place, right behind eurobond buyers and long term dinar securities.
The state guarantees extended to public companies went mainly to Elektroprivreda Srbije (EPS) and Srbijagas. EPS borrowed 67 million euros from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to revitalize the Vlasina hydropower plants and 30 million euros from Germany’s KfW for the Kostolac wind farm, both loans backed by a state guarantee. Elektromreze Srbije borrowed 12 million euros from the French Development Agency, while Serbian Railways (Srbija Voz) borrowed 90 million euros from the European Rail Fleet Financing company and another 42 million euros from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Srbijagas, also under state guarantee, borrowed almost exclusively from domestic banks: the Postal Savings Bank, Banca Intesa and OTP Bank, for gas pipelines serving Belgrade, Valjevo, Loznica and Leskovac and Vranje, as well as for the Horgos project and the rehabilitation of gas pipeline systems. In total, 241 million euros in guarantees went to foreign creditors and 253 million euros to domestic banks, mostly for Srbijagas and EPS.
The government’s final account states that Serbia’s total public debt stood at 39.6 billion euros at the end of 2025. Alongside the new direct borrowing, the document also records a new liability tied to restitution: on September 26, 2025, the government decided to issue euro denominated bonds worth a total of 48.6 million euros, with maturities of five, ten and 12 years, to compensate for seized property under final rulings issued between July 2024 and June 2025.
The Fiscal Council warned in late July that this year’s budget deficit is rising to 3.5 percent of GDP. The data from the 2025 final account now shows exactly which loans last year’s borrowing ran through, from Rafale jets to highways and guarantees for energy companies.
