GDP grows 3.8% in annual terms, three points less than in the previous quarter, after the collapse of exports due to the negative international context
High inflation and the energy crisis are fully affecting the economy. After a good first and second quarter, in the third (July to September) the GDP suffered a sharp slowdown despite the pull of tourism due to the summer season. The quarterly GDP advanced by only 0.2%, while at the annual level it grew by 3.8%, better than expected by some organizations, but well below the previous quarters.
According to the National Accounts data advanced this Friday by the INE, the GDP for the third quarter (0.2%) is 1.3 points lower than the data registered in the second. And the annual variation (3.8%) is three points lower than the 6.8% that advanced from April to June.
Much of this is due to the fact that exports moderated to 1.3% compared to 4.9% in the second quarter. Raymond Torres, director of the Economic Situation at Funcas, explains to this newspaper that the slowdown in the third quarter is fundamentally due to the fact that the foreign sector does not contribute to GDP due to the “more than likely entry into recession of European countries such as Germany” and the «shock» of energy prices in the activity of European markets. In addition, domestic demand is highly affected by prices, since households “are not in a position to continue pulling savings” with a drop in their real income, Torres details.
Thus, family consumption continued to grow by 1.1% quarterly, only one tenth less than the previous quarter, due to the savings accumulated in the pandemic and a labor market that has managed to maintain itself despite the economic slowdown.
As is normal in the summer months, the sectors that have endured the best were hospitality and tourism (1.3%), while construction has suffered a halt due to lack of supplies and energy costs, which fell 0.1% after a year of steady gains.
Despite these data, they are better figures than expected by both the Bank of Spain, which forecast quarter-on-quarter growth of 0.1%, and the Fiscal Authority (Airef), which assumed that the economy had stagnated and doubted that progress could exceed 0%. Of course, the INE warns that the final revision of the GDP data is subject to a lot of uncertainty and that the revision may be of a “greater than usual” magnitude.
From the Ministry of Economy they are optimistic with these data and explain that the country has continued to grow “even in a quarter marked by the deterioration of the external environment and the rise in interest rates.” For this reason, they indicate that the advance of 3.8% in year-on-year terms makes it “very likely” that the annual growth of 2022 will be “even above” the 4.4% of the Government’s forecast.
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