Annual Polish GDP growth in Q1 2023 minus 0.3%; Apr retail sales fall

At the same time, investment continued to grow, while retail sales and industrial output decreased in annual terms in April this year, a release from the Narodowy Bank Polski (NBP), the central bank of Poland, said after its monetary policy council met recently.

The council decided to keep the NBP interest rates unchanged.

Despite the slowdown in activity growth, the labour market situation remains good and unemployment is low.

The number of working persons remains high, although annual growth in employment in the enterprise sector has decelerated.

According to Statistics Poland flash estimate, consumer price index-based (CPI) inflation in the country declined to 13 per cent year on year (YoY) in May this year compared to 14.7 per cent YoY in April.

The decrease in inflation in annual terms was driven by a fall in annual price growth of energy.

It is expected that after a slight decline in April, core inflation significantly decreased in May.

At the same time, despite weakening demand growth, the level of annual inflation index was still affected by a significant increase in costs resulting from an earlier strong surge in global commodity prices and disruptions in global value chains that was passed through to consumer prices.

However, commodity prices and growth of producer price index have continued decreasing, which signals a further easing of external supply shocks.

Together with the lower economic activity growth, it will support a decline in domestic CPI inflation in the coming quarters.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)