PwC experts estimate that the economy will advance this year by 4.3%, compared to the 7% forecast by the Government and that inflation will close 2022 at a rate of 6.6%
Yet another report that casts doubt on the Government’s economic forecasts for this year and the next and lowers them considerably, something that the Executive will most likely have to do next April, when it revises its calculations. In this case, it comes from the ‘Economic Consensus’ drawn up every quarter by PwC based on the opinion of more than 400 Spanish experts, managers and businessmen. Their view of the national outlook is worsened by the war in Ukraine and rising prices, and they cut their previous growth forecast by almost one point. Thus, they estimate that Spain will grow 4.3% this year, compared to the 7% predicted by Moncloa and in 2023 it will grow 3.9%, half a point less than the Government.
This is an increase in GDP that is still solid in historical terms, but we must bear in mind that we are coming from a very deep drop in activity in 2020 and that it was expected that in the current year the recovery that already began in 2021 would be completed , when GDP increased by 5%.
And the same goes for inflation. If in the previous report the respondents understood that the price increase rate would be 3.4% and 2.5%, respectively, in these two years, now it shoots up to 6.6% for 2022 and 4, 7% by 2023. All this because experts consider that “the Spanish economy has entered a complicated phase as a result of the prolongation of the pandemic, supply problems in world trade and the war in Ukraine.”
However, this group of economists believes that the labor market and the tourism sector will be spared from the impact of the Russian invasion. Only 14% of our believe that employment (in theory directly linked to economic growth) will be affected. The impact on the exports of Spanish companies and company sales transactions will also be very weak; only 8% of those consulted give credence to this possibility.