Hungary Q2 growth 'big disappointment' - analysts

Recycling

Data on Hungary's second-quarter GDP were a big disappointment, analysts told MTI on Tuesday.

Hungary's GDP rose an unadjusted 1.5% in Q2 from the same period a year earlier, slowing from 2.5% growth in the previous quarter, the Central Statistics Office (KSH) said in a preliminary estimate early Tuesday.

Analysts had put GDP growth for the period at 2.1-2.3%.

Gergely Suppan of Takarékbank said the worse than expected data mean full-year GDP growth is unlikely to be much over 2%. In light of Q2 GDP data for Germany, Hungary's biggest export market, also published on Tuesday, it is a wonder Hungary's GDP didn't fall quarter-on-quarter, he added.

The data also worsen the outlook for next year, even though the start of production at a plant Daimler is building in Hungary could add 0.6 percentage points to Hungary's GDP growth, Suppan said.

As for earlier expectations of full-year GDP growth around 3%, Erste Bank's Zoltán Árokszállási said "forget it". Industrial output is slowing and the construction sector continues to contract, he added.

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