Economic growth slows in the second quarter

GDP reading: GDP growth waned to 3.3% year on year in the second quarter from 3.9% in the first quarter. On a seasonally adjusted quarter-on-quarter basis, economic growth slowed to 0.8% in Q2 following the previous period's 1.0% increase.

Drivers: The deceleration was solely driven by a weaker performance of the external sector; while exports of goods and services fell at a milder pace of 1.3% year on year in the second quarter (Q1: -2.0% yoy), imports of goods and services growth sped up to 5.2% (Q1: +2.2% yoy). More positively, data for domestic subcomponents was upbeat across the board. Private consumption growth accelerated slightly to 6.1% year on year in the second quarter (Q1: +6.0% yoy), which marked the best reading since Q3 2022. Government spending growth, meanwhile, accelerated to a 4.0% increase in Q2 (Q1: +1.0% yoy). Additionally, fixed investment growth picked up to a three-year high of 12.9% in Q2, following the 10.8% expansion logged in the previous quarter.

GDP outlook: Our Consensus is for the economy to retain solid momentum in H2 as price pressures soften from H1 and the ECB delivers additional rate cuts. Looking at 2024 as a whole, the economy should expand at a quicker pace than last year thanks to EU funds and a rebound in exports. Stronger-than-expected tourism activity poses an upside risk.

Panelist insight: Alen Kovac, analyst at Erste Bank, commented on the outlook: “Private consumption looks set to keep an overall supportive tone owing to ongoing strong labor market factors, resilient consumer sentiment, and vivid consumer credit […]. As external demand goes, tourism is expectedly under the spotlight, and YTD developments are largely matching expectations of modest sector growth being mostly driven by pre-season and post-season performance.”

How should you choose a forecaster if some are too optimistic while others are too pessimistic? FocusEconomics collects Croatian imports projections for the next ten years from a panel of 13 analysts at the leading national, regional and global forecast institutions. These projections are then validated by our in-house team of economists and data analysts and averaged to provide one Consensus Forecast you can rely on for each indicator. By averaging all forecasts, upside and downside forecasting errors tend to cancel each other out, leading to the most reliable imports forecast available for Croatian imports.

Download one of our sample reports to visualize what a Consensus Forecast is and see our Croatian imports projections.

Want to get access to the full dataset of Croatian imports forecasts? Send an email to info@focus-economics.com.