The Central Statistical Office (KSH) of Hungary has released the country’s GDP data for the last quarter of 2024. The economy grew by 0.5 per cent compared to the last quarter.
Since in the two quarters before, the country’s GDP was shrinking (by 0.2 per cent and 0.6 per cent, respectively), Hungary was officially in a recession—although economists started disputing that definition in the summer of 2022, when the United States entered into a recession under the Biden administration.
Year-over-year, Hungary’s GDP grew by 0.4 per cent. Both the 0.5-per-cent quarter-to-quarter and the 0.4-per-cent YOY data are better than originally expected by analysts. Accordingly, the Budapest Stock Exchange’s primary BUX Index jumped 0.72 per cent upon the news breaking. However, it has dropped back down since then, but still managed to close a winning month at the beginning of the new year.
The KSH did not go into detail on exactly what sectors of the economy contributed to the GDP growth and by what proportion, only noting that ‘the combined performance of services’ was what led to the increase in the country’s gross domestic product last quarter. The Hungarian business news site Portolio.hu adds that ‘growth was held back by a decline in the performance of agriculture, industry, and construction sectors’.
According to IMF data, Hungary’s per capita GDP was $46,807 in 2024, which ranks it 30th out of the 48 sovereign states on the European continent. Within the EU, Hungary is ranked ahead of Latvia, Greece, and Bulgaria.
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