The International Monetary Fund has upgraded its projection for economic growth in Hungary for the next two years, and also raised its forecasts for annual average inflation for both years.
Outlined in its World Economic Outlook, the fund raised its forecast for 2017 global economic growth marginally, to 3.5 percent after 3.1 percent growth last year. The forecast for 2018 is 3.6 percent.
The IMF now expects 2017 GDP growth in Hungary to pick up from 2 percent last year to 2.9 percent rather than to 2.5 percent as in the previous outlook released in October 2016. It raised its forecast for the 2018 growth rate to 3.0 percent from 2.1 percent.
The IMF also projects Hungary’s unemployment rate to fall to 4.4 percent this year after a larger than foreseen fall, to 4.9 percent last year. Last October it yet expected the ratio to drop to 6.0 percent in 2016 and to 5.8 percent in 2017. The monetary fund now projects that the unemployment rate will drop to 4.3 percent in 2018.