Goods exports growth accelerated in Oct-23
In Oct-23, goods exports growth accelerated, rising by 10.4% y/y to US$ 495.3mn, after a 0.9% y/y growth in previous month. Meanwhile, Goods imports growth slowed to 3.3% y/y, reaching US$ 1.2bn in October, after growing by 11.1% y/y in September. Consequently, the trade deficit declined by 0.9% y/y to US$ 747.2mn, marking the first decrease since February 2021
Overall, in 10M23, trade deficit increased by 21.7% y/y to US$ 7.6bn, as exports increased by 12.5% y/y to US$ 5.1bn, while imports were up by 17.8% y/y to US$ 12.7bn.
Money transfers stood at US$ 283.0mn in Oct-23
Money transfers were down by 43.6% y/y to US$ 283.0mn in Oct-23 (in line with our expectation), due to the last year’s high base and normalization in transfers from Russia. From major remitting countries, transfers reduced from Russia (-79.4% y/y and +3.8% m/m, accounting for 21.8% of total) and Türkiye (-5.5% y/y). In contrast, there were substantial increases in remittances from Italy (+19.2% y/y, 15.0% of total), USA (+39.2% y/y, 14.7% of total), Greece (+11.0% y/y, 7.5% of total), Germany (+31.1% y/y, 7.2% of total), Israel (+4.4% y/y, 6.1% of total) and Kazakhstan (+97.6% y/y, 5.8% of total). Overall, in 10M23 remittances increased by 6.2% y/y to US$ 3.5bn.
Real GDP growth was 10.4% in 2022, final estimate
Georgia’s economic growth was revised upwards to 10.4% y/y in 2022, from the previous estimate of 10.1%, according to Geostat’s final estimate. In nominal term, GDP increased by 20.4% y/y to GEL 72.3bn (US$ 24.8bn) and nominal GDP per capita stood at US$ 6,676 (+32.9% y/y) in 2022.
In terms of economic sectors, high contributions to the 2022 growth came from ICT (+59.1% y/y), trade (+10.8% y/y), transport (+24.7% y/y), construction (+16.5% y/y) and manufacturing (+10.5% y/y) sectors. Meanwhile, healthcare (-16.3% y/y) and real estate operations (-3.7% y/y) sectors contracted.
In addition, Geostat also revised the 1H23 real GDP growth upwards to 7.9% y/y from the previous estimate of 7.6% y/y. Considering the rapid estimate of real GDP growth in 3Q23, Georgia’s economy grew by 7.0% y/y in 9M23.
We forecast Georgia’s economic growth at 6.8% for the full year 2023 and at 5.0% for 2024.
