GDP, in real terms, underwent an expansion of 1.4 percent from January to March 2024. This after growing 2.1 percent in the previous quarter.INE notes that the positive contribution of domestic demand to the year-on-year variation in Product decreased in the same period. There was a slowdown in investment and private consumption.
“The contribution of net external demand to the year-on-year variation in GDP was zero, after being positive in the previous quarter, having exports of goods and services in volume slowed and imports of goods and services accelerated slightly“, reveals INE.
Comparing with the fourth quarter of 2023, GDP increased by 0.7 percent in volume, a rate identical to that observed in the previous quarter.
“The contribution of net external demand to the chain variation in GDP became positive in the first quarter, reflecting the slowdown in imports of goods and services that was more pronounced than that in exports of goods and services”, reads the INE page.
According to the institute, “the positive contribution of domestic demand decreased, with a reduction in investment and an acceleration in private consumption“.
Inflation estimated at 2.2%
The National Statistics Institute advances even though the annual rate of change in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) will have decreased to 2.2 percent in April 2024a rate lower by 0.1 percentage points than that observed in the previous month.
“The underlying inflation indicator (total index excluding unprocessed food and energy products) will have registered a variation of 2.0% (2.5% in the previous month)”, indicates the INE note.
According to data collected by the Institute, the variation in the index relating to energy products increased to 7.9 percent (4.8 in the previous month), as a result of the base effect associated with the price reduction recorded in April 2023 (monthly variation of -3.2 percent).
The index for unprocessed food products recorded a zero rate of change (-0.5 percent in March).
“Compared to the previous month, the variation in the IPC will have been 0.5% (2.0% in March and 0.6% in April 2023)”, states INE, estimating an average variation in the last 12 months of 2 .6 percent (2.9 in the previous month).
As for the Portuguese Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices (HIPC), there was a year-on-year variation of 2.3 percent (2.6 in the previous month).
