Cyclical Revival in Sight. Economic Outlook for 2013 and 2014

Since the revision of the WIFO forecast of last September, the short-term outlook for the Austrian economy has improved somewhat. This is mainly due to the slight, but broad-based uptick of the leading indicators which suggests that a turning point of the business cycle may have been reached around the turn of the year. Yet, the profile of risk remains uneven and largely corresponds to the assessment of last autumn, with external downward risks somewhat dominating domestic upward risks. In such an environment, the Austrian economy is expected to grow by 1.0 percent in volume in 2013 and by 1.8 percent in 2014.