Against an extremely tense international backdrop, drawing up an economic and financial scenario is rather fraught task. There are many sources of potential disruption on the short term, including the US election, the Middle East conflict and the war in Ukraine, where tensions are at a peak. In particular, the risk that Middle East tensions will spread is sowing uncertainty on the oil market. Moreover...

The residential real-estate market in France has been severely impacted by the sharp rise in mortgage rates since 2022. While the decline in housing sales was quick to materialize, prices in existing properties adjusted with a lag in transactions. On the new housing market, while sales are at historic lows, price declines have been more contained.

Despite inflationary pressures and high interest rates, Italian growth proved "resilient" in 2023. Growth picked up slightly at the start of 2024, with a 0.3% increase in GDP, leaving an overhang of 0.6% for the year. Lower inflation combined with a stable labour market should support a modest recovery in consumption in the coming quarters, though consumer caution and a high savings rate may prevent a...

The Egyptian economy, though weakened, is recovering from a two-year external liquidity crisis. The crisis is a reminder of the extent to which countries with debt and dependent on external financing are vulnerable to investor confidence. Thanks to substantial funding from the United Arab Emirates and the IMF, the country's external liquidity risk has dipped sharply. But this is not a long-term blank...

Economic activity continued to grow in France in Q1 2024, up 0.2% after 0.3% in Q4 2023. The growth overhang at the end of the first quarter thus stands at 0.6% for 2024. 

As we finalised our scenario before the dissolution of the National Assembly, it can be described as “politically neutral” or “with policy unchanged”. But the political picture that appears to be emerging, with none of the coalitions...

UK economic growth was sluggish in 2023, with a slight recession in the second half of the year as tight monetary policy weighed on demand. Economic activity grew strongly in first-quarter 2024, although household consumption remained low. 

Domestic demand, and household consumption in particular, is expected to be the main driver of the coming recovery, driven by solid real income growth and future rate...

The Spanish economy managed to maintain a robust growth rate at the beginning of the year despite numerous unfavourable factors, including the weakness of the Eurozone economies, persistently high inflation, and the impact of the rise in interest rates, which were expected to peak in first-quarter 2024. The strong performance resulted from several key factors, with positive labour-market momentum...

A month after President Emmanuel Macron dissolved the National Assembly and called the election, some signs of a French economy stalling have arguably appeared. At least this is what Bank of France Governor François Villeroy mentioned recently. In practice, this is fully debatable. Although previous episodes of political uncertainty in other countries have triggered downward growth revisions (eg, Greece...

It may seem odd to stick an ‘extension without disruption’ label on an economic and financial scenario beset by political uncertainties of varying intensity, which will be removed either sooner (legislative elections in France) or later (US presidential election). Whereas the second event is likely to significantly structure/alter a scenario’s major plot points, the first is less likely to wipe out the...

The British will be heading out on 4 July to vote in early general elections. Polls predict a victor for Labour that could see the party take a large majority in the House of Commons. Labour has adopted a new philosophy centred on security (aka "securenomics"). On the domestic front, it is planning far-reaching supply-side reforms with a particular focus on private investment.