EU partially approves Spain's sixth recovery payment, suspends €537 million over unmet targets

The European Commission gave a green light to a partial sixth payment of Spain's Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan on Thursday, approving €5.7 billion of the €7.021 billion originally requested. The grant portion faced a €537 million suspension because three objectives linked to the request were not fully met.

Partial green light for the sixth request

Spain had submitted the sixth request covering 67 objectives and 51 milestones. The Commission certified 64 of those 67 objectives as satisfactorily completed, unlocking €5.7 billion. The gross request was €7.021 billion (€5.970 billion in non-repayable grants and €1.051 billion in loans), but the grants approved fell short of the full amount by €537 million.

At this stage, the Commission is not in a position to rule on the assessment of three objectives linked to the sixth payment request, which refer to investments in bilingual vocational training, telecare services and support projects for vulnerable groups, and entrepreneurship and microenterprises.

The three suspended milestones

The suspended targets involve bilingual vocational training, telecare services, and projects supporting vulnerable groups and microenterprises. The Spanish government plans to submit a motivated request to modify the objectives, clarifying the elements needed to demonstrate investment execution. The aim is to incorporate the revised milestones into the seventh and final disbursement.

Those three milestones associated with the sixth disbursement will be reformulated in a technical addendum, which is already being worked on, with the aim of gaining clarity and ensuring they are ready for inclusion in the request for the seventh and last disbursement.

Reforms and investments covered by the payment

The approved funds support wide-ranging reforms. They include the Sustainable Mobility Law, which sets the basis for a decarbonised, digital and efficient transport system, €250 million for scrapping old vehicles and buying zero-emission cars, and the creation of CASA47, the state housing and land entity. Further measures target health system reinforcement, digitalisation of the rail network, industrial modernisation via energy efficiency and digital transformation, and strategic projects for economic recovery (known as Perte).

Frozen fifth-payment milestones released

In parallel, the Commission unlocked €302 million from two milestones that had been suspended from the fifth payment: digitalisation of regional and local entities (€25 million) and partial completion of the fiscal reform (€277 million). Those funds will now be disbursed together with the sixth payment.

Race toward the August deadline

The cumulative EU funds received by Spain now exceed €77 billion, 76% of the €102 billion allocated under the plan. Spain has met 338 milestones and targets overall. With barely two months left, the government must complete all remaining reforms and investments by 31 August 2026 to be eligible to request the seventh and last disbursement of €27 billion, tied to 146 milestones and objectives.