The International Monetary Fund believes that Spain’s GDP will grow by 2.5% this year, compared to the 1.5% it predicted in April, making Spain the engine of growth in the euro zone due to “the greater strength of services and tourism”.
However, the effects of the tourism miracle will not last beyond 31 December 2023, as the IMF has kept its growth estimate for 2024 unchanged at 2%. Until now, this meant that Spanish GDP would grow more next year than this, but with the change in estimates the new reading indicates that the country’s economy will slow down next year.
Eurozone growth will end 2023 with an increase of 0.9%; the international body has only raised its forecast by one tenth of a percentage point, as it considers that certain downside risks, such as the war in Ukraine, still persist.
Among the neighbouring countries, Germany takes the worst part in the IMF’s revisions, with a cut of two tenths, confirming that a recession is expected with a fall in GDP of 0.3% this year. France will grow by 0.8% and Italy by 1.1%. The United Kingdom improves by 0.7 points, and is another of the economies that makes most progress in this latest IMF review, to end 2023 with 0.4%, thus leaving the spectre of recession behind.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the United States is also improving, but not as much as Spain and lags behind with 1.8% (after adding two tenths of a point).
