Nowcast of GDP - fourth quarter of 2024, first quarter of 2025 and inflation - first half of 2025 3/24/2025 Tweet PDF - Nowcast of GDP for the fourth quarter of 2024, the first quarter of 2025, and inflation for the first half of 2025 Key messages: CBBH estimates the annual growth of real economic activity in the fourth quarter of 2024 at 2.6%.According to the projection for the last quarter of 2024, the annual growth of real GDP for 2024 is estimated at 2.5%, which is almost identical with the projection from the autumn round of medium-term macroeconomic projections (2.4%). Preliminary estimate of the annual growth rate of real GDP for the first quarter of 2025 is 2.6%, mainly due to the continuing growth of service sector activities and the average real wages. We estimate that the headline inflation could amount to 3.6%, and core inflation to 3.9% in the first quarter of 2025. A considerable deviation of the estimated inflation in the first quarter compared to the previous round of nowcasts is a consequence of a sudden minimum wage increase for 2025. According to preliminary projections, significant increases of both headline and core inflation are also expected in the second quarter. There is a significant risk of revising inflation upwards and economic activity downwards in the nowcasts for the second quarter. In this round, we have had to rely considerably to expert estimates of the effects of the minimum wage increase on labour market, without having any shock of similar magnitudein the past for comparison. Besides, the data on industrial production were not available for January, while current local and global political trends may also result in significant shocks.
