Ukraine’s economy growing faster than expected - NBU

"In Q3 2019, Ukraine's economy grew by 4.1% year-on-year (y-o-y), higher than estimated by the National Bank... The NBU expected real GDP growth at 3.5% y-o-y in the third quarter. The main reasons for the higher-than-expected economic growth are higher growth in domestic demand, consumer and investment one, as well as export growth," reads the report.

The National Bank noted that compared with the second quarter (4.6% y-o-y), Ukraine’s GDP growth slows down due to weaker indicators of almost all basic activities and financial sector, and under the end-use method - slower growth of household final consumption expenditures and a significant increase in the negative contribution of inventories.

Household final consumption expenditure grew by 8.4% y-o-y against 11.8% y-o-y in the previous quarter. This was driven by a steady increase in household income and high consumer sentiment. Consumption in the government sector also grew (by 1.1% y-o-y) due to increase in spending on social protection, defense and others. Investment growth also accelerated.

The growth in gross fixed capital formation made up 13.9% y-o-y in Q3 against 7.9% in Q2.

 Export growth accelerated to 13.5% y-o-y primarily due to high yield of grain and oilseeds, as well as faster process of harvesting of late grain and oilseeds. On the other hand, import growth slowed down (to 6.2% y-o-y) due to a decrease in imports of coal and oil products. Respectively, the contribution of net exports to real GDP growth for the first time since the end of 2015 was positive (2.2 pp) despite the revaluation trend of the hryvnia.

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