In 2023, more than 70% of the 308 municipalities demonstrated an unfavourable situation considering the evaluation of the general performance ranking and only 85 of these municipalities “can be considered to have a satisfactory level of effectiveness and financial efficiency”, according to the Financial Yearbook of Municipalities Portuguese, under the responsibility of the Accounting and Taxation Research Center of the Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave (CICF/IPCA) and with the support of the Order of Certified Accountants and the Court of Auditors.

The 'rankings' in the Financial Yearbook were prepared based on the scores obtained by municipalities in 10 indicators, for a maximum of 1,900 points, relating to financial efficiency and effectiveness, such as liquidity, the weight of liabilities required in assets, liabilities per inhabitant and direct taxes per inhabitant.

According to the Yearbook, the maximum score in 2023 was obtained by large municipalities, with the best score being achieved by Câmara de Sintra (Lisbon district), with 1,675 points, followed by the municipalities of Maia (Porto district), with 1,592 points, and Santa Maria da Feira (district of Aveiro), with 1,583.

Taking into account only the list of medium-sized municipalities, the councils of Abrantes (1,676), in Santarém, and the Algarve municipalities of Lagoa (1,543) and Tavira (1,470), in the district of Faro, were those that obtained the best results.

At the head of the list of small municipalities with the best results in the global indexes are Grândola (1,687), in Setúbal, Santana (1,622), in Madeira, and Óbidos (1,594), in Leiria.

According to the document, last year 223 municipalities (72.4% of the total universe of 308) obtained a score below 950 points, below 50% of the total score, demonstrating an unfavourable situation.

The majority of the remainder (55 out of 85 municipalities) scored between 50% and 70% of the total score, meaning that in this global ranking “only 85 municipalities can be considered to have a satisfactory level of effectiveness and financial efficiency”, indicate the authors.

Of these 85 municipalities, 55 obtained a score between 50% and 70% of the maximum possible score, 20 municipalities had an overall score greater than or equal to 70% and less than 80% of the total score and 10 municipalities had an overall score greater than or equal to 80% of the total score.

Best districts

The districts of Faro, Leiria, Lisbon and the Autonomous Region of Madeira were those that managed to include half or more of their municipalities in the list of the 100 best municipalities in the country in terms of effectiveness and financial efficiency.

The financial indicators taken into account for this organization of results are liquidity, the ratio between EBITDA (profit before depreciation and financing expenses) and operating revenues, the weight of liabilities required in assets, liabilities per inhabitant, the degree of expenditure coverage (committed expenditure/net liquidated revenue), the average payment period, the degree of execution of the effective balance from the perspective of commitments, the total debt index, the 'surplus' index and direct taxes per inhabitant.