The lower economic growth during the third trimester of 2017 comes as result of lower investments in the Albanian economy.
Official data from the Institution of Statistics, INSTAT, show that investments during the first semester of 2017 grew with almost 13% higher than one year ago, but during the third trimester they grew only with 3.8%, stopping the positive trend.
The causes seem related to the structure itself. Investments in an economy come from three sources: foreign companies, government capital spending and local businesses.
Official data showed that foreign investments were at the same level as the past year, and they are even expected to drop after the work for the TAP pipeline and the Devoll cascade is over.
Predictions are not good for the second source as well, public investments, as the government is determined to reduce the debt.
This leaves local businesses as the only source for new investments. But could the local business increase investments in the economy? The Bank of Albania says that credit for the economy, which is the main source for funding new investments, is still on the stalemate.
In these conditions, the economic slowdown of the third trimester could be a sign that investments may have entered a long-term phase of slowing down.
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