Earlier this week, the provincial government updated their Term Debt Issues document, which lists all the term debt they still have outstanding.
I thought I’d summarize the new term debt taken out during 2025.
| # of term debts | Total term debt | |
|---|---|---|
| January | 2 | $1.450 billion |
| March | 1 | $1.250 billion |
| April | 2 | $1.345 billion |
| June | 2 | $1.375 billion |
| September | 1 | $0.750 billion |
| October | 2 | $2.300 billion |
| Total | 9 | $7.220 billion |
The earliest any of these 6 term debts matures are the two taken out in June, both of which mature in June 2030; the June debt also matures that month. One of the term debts taken out last January is set to mature at the end of 2054, the latest of the 9 debts.
One of the April debts matures in 2045. Four of the debts—September, one of the Octobers, the other January, and the other April—all mature in 2035. The other October debt matures in 2032, and both June debts mature in 2030.
Missing from the report is the purpose of the debt. Prior versions had the purpose listed as “government” or “on-lending”; although there was one from 2010 that was labelled “TPP liabilities”. No term debt issued since June 2021 has listed a debt purpose.
The interest rates on the 9 debts in 2025 range from 2.05% to 4.45%. However, the effective cost of debt (or the interest rate after tax deductions) ranges from 3.18% to 4.48%.
This new $7.22 billion brings the total existing term debt traded by the provincial government since the UCP were elected to $48.178 billion, spread out over 94 transactions.
Keep in mind that this isn’t the total amount of term debt the UCP has taken out, as a handful of debts have since matured.
If we add the new debt borrowed during 2025 and subtract any term debts that matured last year, the total amount of term debt owed by the Alberta government sits at $89.449 billion, as of the end of 2025. More than half of that total debt (53.86%) was issued since the UCP were first elected nearly 7 years ago.
Even though the government owes less than $100 billion at the moment, there was a point during the UCP administration when Alberta’s total term debt was above $100 billion. However, several terms debts issued under the PCs, NDP, and UCP have since matured, which has brought down the overall debt still owed.
A little more than a third of the still outstanding debt (39.13%) was issued during the NDP administration. The remaining 6.9% or so was issued under the PC government, dating back to 2006. That means that nearly 93% of the debt that Alberta currently owes was incurred under the NDP and UCP.
The UCP borrowing activities has been climbing recently, after shrinking in 2022. They borrowed 4 term debts during 2022, but 6 in 2023 and 9 in both 2024 and 2025, as outlined earlier in this article.
During 2021, however, they took out 20, at a combined value of $9.31 billion.
Either way, here’s how the value of the debts look like broken down by month during the UCP’s term:
And by budget year.
Obviously, the pandemic had a lot to do with this. Their 3 highest months were during the first 5 months of the pandemic. The term debts still outstanding that were settled between March and July 2020 now total $11.405 billion.
The next largest month, was 6 months before the pandemic, however: September 2019 saw the UCP issuing $3 billion in term debts.
In fact, before the pandemic, the UCP had already borrowed nearly $4.6 billion in term debts. So, for every $10 or so in term debt the UCP has issued since taking power, $1 of it was issued before the pandemic.
It’s interesting to see that the UCP has borrowed more term debt in the current budget year than they did in the 2022–2023 budget year, both in terms of the number of debts and the total value of those debts.
Keep in mind that the data for the 2025–2026 doesn’t include the first quarter of 2026, so it could end up even higher.
It’ll be interesting to see how the last year of Danielle Smith’s second term as premier plays out (assuming she does not call an early election). Will she continue to increase the debt each year, or will this be the highest she goes?
Something to remember is that 18 of Alberta’s term debt matured last year. Of those, 7 had been settled when the PC government was in power and totalled $1.92 billion. Another $3.25 billion from 5 settlements under the PC government also matured. The remaining 6 were settled by the UCP government during the first 2 months of the COVID-19 pandemic and came to a collective $3.8 billion.
