Over the last few months, doubts regarding the health of the periphery countries’ public accounts have diminished. The progress made in European governance, the correction of the main imbalances in these countries and the incipient recovery in activity in the euro area as a whole have contributed to this improvement. The risk premium, the star of this crisis, is reflecting this situation with widespread falls. Fears of a possible default in the short term therefore appear to have receded. However, the levels of public debt are still very high, making it impossible to completely dispel doubts regarding whether, sooner or later, further haircuts will have to be applied. Will the periphery countries be able to take their public debt to safer levels? According to the IMF, on average the periphery countries will end 2013 with a public debt of 129% of GDP, 61 p.p. above the level of 2007. The euro area as a whole is expected to reach a level of 96% of GDP, an increase of 29 p.p. Given this scenario, adjustment towards less strained levels is practically an obligation for periphery governments. A country’s public debt is usually expressed as a percentage of GDP, indicating its capacity to repay. There are therefore only two ways to dispel all doubts: either by reducing the numerator, mainly through primary fiscal surpluses (the fiscal balance before including interest payments); or by increasing the denominator via growth in nominal GDP.(1) Let us therefore look at each factor in turn.