In its opinions published today on the budgetary plans of the euro area Member States for 2020, the EU executive said that Portugal's draft budgetary plan for next year presents a "risk of significant deviation from the adjustment path towards the medium-term budgetary objective" and "compliance with the reference value for debt reduction".

Together with Portugal, the European Commission said that "the draft budgetary plans pose a risk of non-compliance with the Stability and Growth Pact in 2020" in the case of Belgium, Spain, France, Italy, Slovenia, Slovakia and Finland,

The EU executive stressed the "importance of these euro area member states including in the updated draft budgetary plans additional measures necessary" to comply with European rules.

"For Portugal, Slovenia, Slovakia and Finland, the public debt has either fallen below the reference value of 60% of Gross Domestic Product or is following an appropriate path in this direction," the EU executive noted, adding that these four member states "have also achieved a budgetary balance that provides a considerable margin towards the reference value of 3% of GDP.