hopes Spanish economy revenues deteriorated accelerated since the end of last year, as indicated by the third rdownward revision consecutive predictions The growth figures of the Bank of Spain, the body headed by Pablo Herández de Cos, calculated this Friday: GDP Spain will increase by 4.1 percent slightly less than anticipated State and analysts’ consensus (4.3%) and lower than the agency predicted in April (4.5%) and December (5.4%). Since its forecast last September (6.3%), the cut is already 2.2 percentage points.
this inflationary spiralBehind this darkening of the picture, which started last summer and aggravated by the occupation of Ukraine, the Central bank softened its forecast for this reason. average inflation annual for 2022 7.5% to 7.2% due to the entry into force of the Iberian mechanism for lower the electricity bill (will lower CPI by 0.5 points this year), but “significantly” raised Forecasts for 2023 (2% to 2.6%) and 2024 (1.6% to 1.8%). your prognosis for underlying Not taking into account energy and fresh food prices, they are now 3.2%, 2.2% and 2% (2.8%, 1.8% and 1.7% in April) respectively. “The intensity and persistence of the recovery in price continues to surprise the upside,” he warned.
Despite all this, the institution improved its forecast. job creation Hours worked for this year (4.6% from 1.9%), although decreased in 2023 (from 2% to 1.5%) and 2024 (from 1.6% to 1.1%) to ) is measured. As a result, his prediction reducing unemployment (from 14.8% last year to 13%, 12.8% and 12.7% respectively) now better than April (13.5%, 13.2% and 12.8%). when it comes public deficitnow predicts a faster reduction from 6.9% to 4.6%, 4.5% and 4.2% in 2021 (5, 5.2% and 4.7% in April).
uncertain stabilization
Therefore, the macroeconomic situation stabilizer. GDP forecast for next two years (2.8% in 2023 and 2.6% in 2024) hasn’t changed much and this year’s 0.4 percentage point decline primarily responds to the fact that the growth figure for the first quarter was (0.3%). noticeably lowwhat is expected by the r variant omicron of the coronavirus and occupation of Ukraine. However, this effect was partially offset by the better-than-expected performance of industries most affected by the pandemic, such as restaurants and tourism. “Economic activity in recent months increased its dynamism‘, says the supervisory body.
In any case, the level GDP before will not be reached until the pandemic second half of 2023initially in the third quarter, expected to occur now last September, mid 2022. This is why the war in Ukraine punishes activity by causing high prices in many countries. raw materials (energy, minerals and food), self-confident the coming together of economic agents and the dynamism of the world markets bottleneck in global supply chains (aggravated by China’s ‘covid zero’ policy).
However, these negative effects were counteracted by others of a positive sign, for example. removal of restrictions associated with the health crisis, financial measures and regulatory measures to deal with inflation and a partial recovery of confidence following the downturn it suffered as a result of the war. As a result of all this, the Bank of Spain second quarter will be 0.4%slightly higher than the first, but the figure is a “high degree of uncertainty”.
end of the year
The oversight body, therefore, is a “remarkable event” in short-term activities but these do not occur “additional significant inconveniences”copper growth “more dynamism” In the last part of the year, thanks to the recovery of confidence, the improvement in global supply problems and the activation of European funds. As a result, tightening financing conditions due to interest rate hikes promoted by central banks may cause “a certain softening” in the activity expansion rate.
In line with this, the Bank of Spain, Inflationary pressures will continue to accelerate In the short term, due to the war in Ukraine, China’s anticovid policy, a “partial transfer” of increase in companies’ costs to final prices, and a “relatively strong” recovery of demand for services that require more social interaction. However, these factors they will fadeAs long as “most of the transfer of recent cost increases to sales prices has already taken place” and “wage demands” “are only limitedly responsive to the rise in inflation, in line with what has been observed to date”.