GKI maintains projection for 4% GDP growth in 2006, ups end-year inflation forecast.

GKI maintains projection for 4% GDP growth in 2006, ups end-year inflation forecast. Economic researcher GKI maintained its projection for 4% GDP growth in 2006, the latest forecast revealed. Nonetheless, the expectations for investments in the economy were revised downwards to 2% increase compared to 5% included in the October’s forecast. We recall that the CSO announced that investments decreased by 0.4% in Q1-Q3 (down 3.8% in Q3 alone) and despite the rather low base from Q4/2005 we remain sceptical about marked rebound. GKI projects that exports and imports would increase by 15% and 13% in the full-year, but the researcher revised slightly downwards the trade gap forecast from EUR 2.8bn to EUR 2.5bn. Another important change is the end-2006 inflation forecast, which now is expected at 6.5% opposed to the earlier 6.2% y/y.