GlobalSource Partners | Country Insights

President Alberto Fernandez (AF) gave a long yet carefully structured speech during the Congress’s opening session. He reviewed his government’s achievements, defended it from what he called “malicious criticism that responds to unspeakable interests of concentrated economic powers”, and made sev...

A Second Denial to Debate the Bill in Favor of Dollarization

ECUADOR · In Brief · 02 Mar 2021

By the end of last year considering general comments from legislators on the subject bill, we had hopes for its approval. However, so far, the Administrative Council from the Assembly has denied twice the possibility to debate the bill in the plenary session. Albeit Ministry of Finance Mauricio P...

Give me some doughnuts

CHILE · Report · 02 Mar 2021 · 1 response

The Monthly Index of Economic activity (IMACEC) in December surprised strongly on the upside, and provided a slight upward bias to our 2021 growth projection of 6.5%. The monthly variation of the seasonally-adjusted series excluding mining was 4.4%, the best result since September 2020. According...

A few words on GDP, EURHUF, vaccination and central bank policy

HUNGARY · In Brief · 02 Mar 2021

KSH (the Statistical Office) has just revised its GDP figures for Q4 2020. The revision has taken a distinct upwardly direction: in real terms and on sda basis, GDP rose by 1.4% qoq and fell by 4.1% yoy in Q4, as opposed to the preliminary +1.1% yoy, -4.3% yoy figures.Now that the economy seems t...

Erdogan forced into premature normalization

TURKEY · In Brief · 02 Mar 2021

As you read these lines, President Erdogan will have unveiled another pretentious “Human Rights Reform Plan”, which I don’t intend to cover, because if the president truly wanted human rights improvements, he wouldn’t order dissidents and journalists to be kept behind bars. Instead, I want to bri...

Slovakia will receive 2 million doses of Sputnik V

RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 02 Mar 2021

On March 2 the first batch of the Russian coronavirus vaccine arrived in Slovakia. Moscow is delighted with this commerical and soft power success. Slovakia is an EU country. The EU's vaccine rollout has been notoriously slow.Austria and the Czech Republic are in discussions about buying Sputnik ...

The dangers of deafness to suffering

COLOMBIA · Report · 01 Mar 2021 · 2 responses

Last year’s 6.8% contraction represents, not surprisingly, the worst economic downturn in Colombian history – and only the fourth year in more than a century in which the economy has posted negative results. Though most sectors, especially manufacturing and commerce, followed overall GDP, agricul...

Synthesis of the Brazilian economy

BRAZIL ECONOMICS · Report · 01 Mar 2021

While Brazil is experiencing the worst moments of the pandemic, without any outlook for improvement in the short run, the costs of the alliance of Bolsonaro with the Centrão are starting to appear, without any sign of the claimed benefits to the country. On the contrary, the vestiges of the liber...

Politics: Governability at risk, Part I

MEXICO · Report · 01 Mar 2021

No one ever doubted that this year’s midterm elections would greatly magnify political tensions, especially as the contest begins to hit its stride, with competing camps' getting down to the work of defining one another and their respective candidates with the usual mix of negative and sometimes ...

Main questions about the Emergency PEC and other weekly topics

BRAZIL POLITICS · Report · 01 Mar 2021

In the Senate, the highlight is the vote on the Emergency PEC. In the House, we expect the permanent committees to be installed. Regarding the economy, we highlight the release of the 2020 GDP results on Wednesday. This week's Talking Points: * The Emergency PEC: main questions. ...

Eonomics: February data point to future challenges

MEXICO · Report · 01 Mar 2021

Even as some branches of industrial and service activity continued to pare their losses from the lows of 2020 and the trend remains toward a reopening of activity, GDP contracted -4.3% in the fourth quarter (and -8.2% for 2020), with health the only service sector to show growth. We expect a simi...

Growth 2020: A Pyrrhic Victory of sorts

TURKEY · Report · 01 Mar 2021

The Turkish economy grew by a somewhat lower than expected 5.9%, y/y, and 1.7%, q/q, in the final quarter of 2020. For the year as a whole, GDP hence grew by 1.8% in 2020, making Turkey one of the two G-20 countries, next to China, that registered positive growth in a devastating, pandemic-hit ye...

Hi-tech services continue to support growth

ISRAEL · Report · 01 Mar 2021

* Hi-tech service exports expanded rapidly in Q420, supporting shekel appreciation. * Rapid growth of employment in the hi-tech sector (high income) is expected to support higher rental prices. * The economy is opening up rapidly, supporting economic growth and lower unemployment. * ...

Improvement in the economy

INDONESIA · Report · 01 Mar 2021

Indonesia has already seen a certain measure of improvement in the economy in the past quarters. While the country experienced a painful situation due to the restrained mobility from the pandemic, which led to a semi-lockdown in Q2 2020, Indonesia has continued to improve, slashing the negative g...

From a bright economic history to the current negative narrative: the case of Panama in 2021-2022

PANAMA · Report · 01 Mar 2021

February´s IMF country report analyzes the Panamanian economy in the context of the approval of the Precautionary and Liquidity Line (PLL) of US$ 2.7 BB. The IMF usually is bullish concerning Panama, and the document follows that pattern, describing its macroeconomic trajectory and its growth pot...