{"id":27444,"date":"2023-04-28T12:25:33","date_gmt":"2023-04-28T12:25:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/italys-economy-grows-more\/"},"modified":"2023-04-28T12:29:38","modified_gmt":"2023-04-28T12:29:38","slug":"italys-economy-rebounds-in","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/italys-economy-rebounds-in\/","title":{"rendered":"Italy’s economy rebounds in Q1 in boost for Meloni"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Gavin Jones and Giuseppe Fonte<\/p>\n

ROME (Reuters) -Italy’s economy grew by 0.5% in the first quarter from the previous three months, preliminary data showed on Friday, a stronger recovery than expected after a slight contraction at the end of last year.<\/p>\n

On a year-on-year basis, first quarter gross domestic product in the euro zone’s third largest economy was up 1.8%, national statistics bureau ISTAT said.<\/p>\n

A Reuters survey of 29 analysts had forecast a 0.2% quarterly increase and a 1.4% rise compared with the year earlier.<\/p>\n

Analysts made favourable comparisons with Germany, whose economy stagnated in the first quarter.<\/p>\n

“Germany disappoints, while Italy powers ahead,” Franziska Palmas wrote in a report for Capital Economics, noting that Italy, the euro zone’s traditional growth laggard, “continues to surprise to the upside.”<\/p>\n

Giancarlo Giorgetti, the economy minister in Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing administration, commented on the data saying “responsible ambition has paid off”.<\/p>\n

In its Economic and Financial Document (DEF) unveiled this month, the Treasury raised its 2023 growth forecast to 1% from a 0.6% projection made in November, when Rome had estimated two straight quarters of GDP contraction between October and March.<\/p>\n

“GDP growth in the first quarter belies the prophets of doom who had diagnosed a possible recession for our country,” Industry Minister Adolfo Urso said after Friday’s data. <\/p>\n

ISTAT said the first quarter growth was supported by both domestic demand and exports.<\/p>\n

It gave no numerical breakdown of components with its preliminary GDP estimate, but said industry and services had expanded, while agriculture stagnated.<\/p>\n

The fourth quarter of last year was unrevised, showing a 0.1% quarter-on-quarter fall and a 1.4% rise year-on-year.<\/p>\n

Throughout last year the economy held up consistently better than analysts had forecast despite headwinds from the war in Ukraine and sky-high energy costs, and grew by 3.7% over the year as a whole.<\/p>\n

Looking ahead, however, the outlook has been clouded by European Central Bank interest rate hikes aimed at curbing inflation.<\/p>\n

Adding to the challenge, Meloni needs to phase out expansionary policies adopted since the COVID-19 pandemic as European Union authorities are pushing for fiscal tightening.<\/p>\n

Italy is also facing growing difficulties in meeting policy conditions set by the European Commission for the transfer of billions of euros of COVID-19 pandemic recovery funds, intended to support growth.<\/p>\n

(Editing by Mark Potter)<\/p>\n

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By Gavin Jones and Giuseppe Fonte ROME (Reuters) -Italy’s economy grew by 0.5% in the first quarter from the previous three months, preliminary data showed on Friday, a stronger recovery than expected after a slight contraction at the end of last year. On a year-on-year basis, first quarter gross domestic product in the euro zone’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":27445,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1216],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-27444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-economy","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportEconomy\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3R0CO-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27444"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27797,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27444\/revisions\/27797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}