Latvia

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Shrinking external demand resulted in GDP declining both in the second half of 2023 and for the year as a whole. Looking ahead, in 2024 the economy will recover by just 1.6%. Exports will pick up only gradually, since EU – and particularly German – industrial activity will remain subdued. The main growth driver will be investment financed from the NextGenerationEU programme. Consumer price inflation at long last fell below 2% in the final months of 2023 and will remain at around that mark in 2024 and 2025. Although this will result in real incomes again rising fairly swiftly, private household demand will remain sluggish until the second half of 2024 – consumer sentiment continues to be fairly pessimistic. Given the rather low growth, the public deficit will amount to 3% of GDP this year. The labour market remained quite tight last year, and the unemployment rate is expected to decline to 6.4% in 2024 (and further thereafter). In the next years, growth is projected to pick up to 2.4% in 2025 and 2.8% in 2026.
        FORECAST*
Main Economic Indicators202120222023202420252026
Population, 1000 persons188418791880...
GDP, real change in %6.73.0-0.31.62.42.7
GDP per capita (EUR at PPP)232102542024960...
Gross industrial production, real change in %6.70.9-5.0...
Unemployment rate - LFS, in %, average7.66.96.56.46.26.0
Average gross monthly wages, EUR127713731537...
Consumer prices, % p.a.3.217.29.12.22.52.6
Fiscal balance in % of GDP-7.2-4.7-2.8-3.0-2.5-2.0
Public debt in % of GDP44.041.5....
Current account in % of GDP-3.9-4.8-4.0-2.0-2.5-2.8
FDI inflow, EUR m316611201386...
Gross external debt in % of GDP110.5102.398.6...


Basic data are continuously updated.

* Forecasts are changed beginning of January, April, July and November.
See Press Conferences.

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Monthly Report No. 1/2024

Vasily Astrov, Alexandra Bykova, Rumen Dobrinsky, Selena Duraković, Meryem Gökten, Richard Grieveson, Doris Hanzl-Weiss, Gabor Hunya, Branimir Jovanović, Niko Korpar, Sebastian Leitner, Isilda Mara, Olga Pindyuk, Sandor Richter, Marko Sošić, Bernd Christoph Ströhm, Maryna Tverdostup and Adam Żurawski
wiiw Monthly Report No. 1, January 2024
50 pages including 5 Tables and 18 Figures

Details

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Executive summary

Branimir Jovanović
in: Beneath the Veneer of Calm
wiiw Forecast Report No. Autumn 2023, October 2023 , pp. I-VI
Details


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