The timing of transparency and oversight: institutional determinants for controlling federal public debt bands

Abstract

The Annual Financing Plan (PAF) establishes bands for the composition of the Federal Public Debt (DPF) and guides investor expectations. However, there is little evidence on the factors that affect compliance. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the impact of the frequency of TCU inspections and delays in the publication of reports by the National Treasury on the risk of noncompliance with the PAF bands. This quantitative, descriptive, exploratory, and documentary study uses data collected between 2018 and 2024. It constructs a logistic model that estimates how institutional variables influence the risk of noncompliance with the bands. The results show that a one-standard-deviation delay in the publication of the Monthly Debt Report (≈4 days) increases the probability of noncompliance by 19.1 percentage points (p < 0.05), making timeliness of transparency (ITF) the most robust predictor. In contrast, a greater number of deliberations by the Federal Court of Auditors (IACE) is associated with greater risk, suggesting predominantly reactive oversight by the Court. The conclusion is that strengthening fiscal discipline requires ensuring timely information disclosure—a low-cost, high-impact mechanism—and rethinking the timing and nature of external oversight interventions. The study also constructs unprecedented monthly proxies for external oversight and transparency, demonstrating that they retain explanatory power after macroeconomic oversight.