Off the wire
• Spanish stock market rises 0.35 pct  • East African think tank urges regional infrastructure collaboration towards mutual growth  • FTSE 100 drops slightly on U.S. GDP data  • Erste Bank records 1.6 bln USD loss in 2014  • Turkish currency drops to record low against US dollar  • Ukraine says gas dispute with Russia not to harm transit to Europe  • Urgent: Obama prefers short-term DHS funding over shutdown: White House  • UAE reopens Yemen embassy in Aden  • Danish GDP up 1 pct in 2014  • Hungarian PM upbeat about past year in State of Nation Address  
You are here: 　 Home

Economic institute confirms stagnation of Austrian economy

Xinhua, February 28, 2015 Adjust font size:

The Austrian economy was unable to gain any traction in the final quarter of 2014, leading to a second consecutive quarter of zero GDP growth, the Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO) confirmed in a new report on Friday.

Some people feared the figures would slip into the red, but the 0.2 percent year-on-year drop in growth for the final quarter was not enough for this to occur. In its previous flash estimate in January, WIFO expected a 0.1 percent drop in growth for the quarter.

Problem areas were sluggish consumer demand and the ongoing reluctance of companies to invest, as had been previously indicated by the institute. A slight increase in foreign economic impulses had little overall impact.

The institute, however, revised its growth calculations for the third quarter slightly upward, from an initial 0.2 percent growth to 0.4 percent growth, compared to the same quarter in 2013.

WIFO said its previous economic view of 2014 had on the whole not changed much, and stood by its January calculation of 0.3 percent growth for the full year. Endit