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Economic experts raise inflation to 7.9% and warn of the persistence of the "negative environment"

2022-07-20T15:16:47.581Z


The Funcas Panel lowers the GDP growth forecast for 2022, to 4.2% A woman pays for her purchase at a greengrocer in Barcelona.Carles Ribas (EL PAÍS) The domino effect that has hit the economy continues to take its toll on all forecasts. The latest to worsen the forecasts is the Funcas panel, published this Wednesday. The document averages between the estimates of 19 analysis houses and concludes that Spain will close 2022 with more inflation and less growth: GD


A woman pays for her purchase at a greengrocer in Barcelona.Carles Ribas (EL PAÍS)

The domino effect that has hit the economy continues to take its toll on all forecasts.

The latest to worsen the forecasts is the Funcas panel, published this Wednesday.

The document averages between the estimates of 19 analysis houses and concludes that Spain will close 2022 with more inflation and less growth: GDP will advance 4.2%, one tenth less than calculated in May, and prices will grow 7 .9%, one point more than estimated in the previous panel.

Behind this deterioration are the usual suspects, with the energy crisis and the war in Ukraine at the forefront, which put pressure and increase uncertainty about the evolution of the global economy.

"Concern about the global economic outlook has been exacerbated since the last panel," warns the

savings

bank think tank .

“The invasion of Ukraine has aggravated tensions in the energy and raw material markets, dragging down the rest of the prices and pushing inflation to unprecedented levels since the 1980s in advanced economies (...).

Practically all the panellists consider that the external environment is unfavourable, both in the EU and outside it.

The expectation is that this negative environment will continue or get worse in the coming months, according to a large majority of analysts”.

Funcas had already lowered its growth forecasts, in line with the main internal and international organizations, in the face of an increasingly challenging context.

Inflation has been on the rise for months and has already become one of the main puzzles for governments and central banks.

The rise in prices, which was initially believed to be temporary - caused by the gap between demand and supply when the anticovid restrictions were lifted - has only worsened with the conflict in Ukraine: energy prices have settled in a spiral bullish that has already infected much of the rest of the shopping basket, to which are added the Russian threats of a cut in gas supply.

In this scenario, none of the 19 analysis houses foresees inflation rates below 7% for this year.

The highest is that of Funcas ―8.8%―, while CEOE and Analistas Financieros Internacionales (AFI) are the most optimistic, with 7.2%.

In 2023, a rebound of 3.1% is expected, 0.9 points more than the previous forecast.

The core inflation rate, which does not take into account energy and fresh food ―the most volatile elements of the shopping basket―, has also been revised upwards: 4.6% for this exercise and 3, 3% for the next.

This sustained rise in prices has led central banks to change the course of their monetary policies, with interest rate hikes aimed at cooling down the economy, but which at the same time have the risk of slowing down the recovery after the pandemic.

"Monetary policy faces the need to contain inflationary pressures without derailing the recovery or causing new financial risks to appear," Funcas warns.

Deceleration

Despite the downward revision in growth, the panel points to an advance in GDP of 0.4% and 0.5% in the central quarters of the year, pushed by a tourist season that predicts record figures, close to the registered before the pandemic.

However, this rate will moderate in the last three months of the year, down to 0.3%.

"The end of the year could be weighed down by the sharp rise in inflation and the uncertainties arising from the war in Ukraine and its impact on energy markets - especially on gas supply -", the agency warns.

Repsol has the worst growth forecast for 2022: 3.7%, compared to the average of 4.2% for the panel and 4.3% for the Government.

For 2023, it is BBVA that signs the worst forecast: a GDP growth of 1.8% compared to the consensus of 2.5%, a percentage that in turn has been cut by five tenths due to the lower growth expected in the second half of this year.

"The lower growth rate expected for the second half of this year has a more pronounced impact on the growth rate forecast for 2023, which, due to the lower drag effect, has been cut by five tenths," explains Funcas.

The positive evolution of the labor market in the first part of the year, on the other hand, has led to improved employment forecasts: the expected average unemployment rate for 2022 drops two tenths, to 13.5%, and would drop to 13, 1% in 2023. It also improves the public deficit forecast compared to the previous panel, by three and one tenth, respectively, to 5.2% of GDP in 2022 and 4.7% in 2023 ―the Government calculates 5% and 3.9%―.

Source: elparis

All business articles on 2022-07-20

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