Peru cenbank eyes Q1 growth after rough 2023

Peru's central bank expects the country's recession-hit economy to grow in the first quarter of this year, thanks in part to significant recovery in the construction sector in January, a top bank official said on Friday. With the construction rebound, "We're likely expecting this first quarter of 2024 to be the first quarter of growth after four consecutive quarters of contraction that we had in 2023," the bank's chief economist, Adrian Armas.

Peru's central bank expects the country's recession-hit economy to grow in the first quarter of this year, thanks in part to significant recovery in the construction sector in January, a top bank official said on Friday.

With the construction rebound, "We're likely expecting this first quarter of 2024 to be the first quarter of growth after four consecutive quarters of contraction that we had in 2023," the bank's chief economist, Adrian Armas. Peru has not yet published official growth data for the fourth quarter of 2023.

Armas on Friday said that the central bank maintains a prior projection that the economy shrunk 0.5% in 2023. The world's No. 2 copper producer, Peru fell into a recession last year due to the El Nino weather phenomenon, lower private investment and lingering effects from anti-government protests in late 2022 and early 2023.