Macroeconomic Forecast Georgia

With first half of 2012 merchandise trade data now available from the National Bank of Georgia, we believe that our full-year trade in goods deficit forecast may be looking overly optimistic. The trade in goods balance stood at a US$2.59bn deficit in the first six months of the year, implying that a similar trade performance in H212 could leave our US$3.55bn deficit projection for this year well off the mark. To be sure, while our import of goods forecast of US$7.13bn for this year looks rather well placed, our export projections are beginning to look overly ambitious. Exports of goods measured US$1.14bn, suggesting that H2 would need to see a strong pick-up in exports of goods to meet our US$3.58bn forecast.

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