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Analysts: Slovak Economy Hit Rock Bottom in 1Q09 and Is Rebounding
Thursday 03 December 2009 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, December 3 (TASR) - The Slovak economy has grown quarter-on-quarter by 1.6 percent in 3Q09, representing the second highest increase among the EU27 during this period, the Slovak Statistics Office reported on Thursday.
At the same time, the country's economy fell y-o-y in the third quarter of this year by 4.8 percent in fixed prices.
UniCredit Bank analyst Lubomir Korsnak said that this development confirms that the Slovak economy has bottomed out in 1Q09. "Its gradual awakening reflects mainly the revival of economies of significant business partners, such as Germany," said Korsnak.
According to VUB analyst Martin Lenko, the slight decrease in household consumption was surprising - 0.3 percent y-o-y. A more significant downturn was expected due to falling retail revenues and growing unemployment.
Korsnad predicts that the economy should countinue rising in the 4Q09 as well, even though the y-o-y GDP decrease is expected to be 5.0 percent.
In the beginning of next year, the economy should further take advantage of the revival of the economies of the most significant Slovak trading partners – even though this renewal is still tentative, reflecting only this year's stimuli that will gradually fade out. Another risk is that of a domestic and foreign household consumption decrease due to still growing unemployment and slower increases of salaries, said Korsnak.
Despite the expected overall weakness in 2H10, UniCredit Bank analyst estimates that the Slovak economy could grow by 2.6 percent next year, and this also thanks to the positive influence of private-public-partnership project in highway contruction.
Lenko estimates that the economy will grow by 2.4 percent next year.
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