Export expectations improving in CEE

Erste Bank Research Team Erste Bank

On the radar

In Croatia, the 3Q23 GDP delivered positive surprise as economy expanded by 2.8% y/y.
Retail sales contracted by 15.6% y/y in Slovenia in October.
Today there are no releases scheduled in the region.

Economic developments

Today, we look at the export expectations for the months ahead in the region. In the last quarter of 2023, we have seen an improvement in the export expectations compared to the previous quarter in all countries but Romania. Compared to the situation in 2022, however, an improvement was noticed in Croatia, Poland and Serbia. In Czechia, Hungary or Slovakia that belong to most open and export-oriented economies in the region, export expectations for months ahead remain much lower in 2023 compared to the previous year. Such development translates into higher uncertainty about the performance of the industry in these economies in the upcoming year and we see it as a risk for more sluggish recovery.

Market developments

CEE currencies keep strengthening against the euro and the Polish zloty outperforms as EURPLN dropped to 4.42. On the bond market, long term yields went down as much as 10 to 15 basis points in Hungary or Slovakia since the beginning of the week. In Romania, budget deficit for the months January to October reached as much as 4% of GDP. Last year, for the same period of time Romania had a budget deficit of 3.3%. Romania also announced the bond supply plan for December, and it plans to raise in total RON 4 billion (RON 3.5 billion in bonds and RON 500 million in T-bills.

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Erste Bank Research Team

Erste Bank

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