The Conference Board, has recently adjusted its projection for global real gross domestic product (GDP) growth in 2024, increasing it to 2.8% from the previous estimate of 2.7% made in January. This revision primarily reflects a more optimistic outlook for developed economies. The organization maintains its expectation of a slight deceleration from the robust 3.1% growth experienced last year.
For 2025, The Conference Board forecasts a growth rate of 2.9%, indicating that the global economy may be approaching a more sustainable level of expansion. This projection suggests that as pandemic-related challenges diminish and monetary policy begins to normalize, the global economy could transition to a steadier pace of growth.
The slight enhancement to the 2024 forecast primarily stems from a more positive outlook for growth in developed economies, with the think tank’s projections rising to 1.4% from 1.1% in January.
The most significant shift in growth expectations is observed in the United States, where The Conference Board now predicts a real GDP growth of 1.9% for the year, compared to the previous forecast of 1.4%. This adjustment reflects a reduced likelihood of negative real GDP growth mid-year, indicating that a recession is no longer anticipated in the United States during mid-2024. However, consumer spending is expected to moderate, resulting in overall GDP growth slowing to a pace ranging between 0% and 1% over the second and third quarters.
Forecasts for the euro area experienced a marginal decline, mainly attributed to slight downgrades in the outlook for France and the Netherlands. However, the modestly weaker euro area forecasts were counterbalanced by significant forecast upgrades for much of Eastern Europe.
In Taiwan, following a recession at the end of 2022 and the beginning of 2023, the economy rebounded vigorously, with quarterly growth rates averaging 8% for the remainder of 2023. This strong performance led to an average 2024 GDP level projection of 4.5%, up from the previous forecast of 3.5% in January.
The overall growth forecast for emerging and developing economies remains relatively stable, with a projected real GDP growth of 4.4% in 2023, followed by a modest slowdown to 3.9% in 2024 and a slight uptick to 4.1% in 2025. Main drivers for the slowdown in 2024 include China and India, while growth forecasts for other major emerging and developing countries remain largely unchanged.
Developing Asian economies, excluding China and India, are anticipated to experience a gradual acceleration in growth from 4% in 2023 to 4.3% in 2024 and 4.6% in 2025.
Latin America is expected to witness slower growth in 2024, primarily due to an anticipated slowdown in the United States during the second and third quarters.
Improved growth trends are anticipated in the Middle East & North Africa region and Sub-Saharan Africa.
China’s growth forecast remains unchanged, with an expected slowdown in the expansion rate from 5.2% in the previous year to 4.1% in 2024 and further to 3.9% in 2025. The think tank notes persistently low consumer confidence in China, reflecting ongoing challenges such as the aftermath of the 2022 lockdown and the evolving property crisis.
