Key events in EMEA next week

Hungary reports first quarter GDP figures on Tuesday. Looking back, this period was quite a mixed bag with significant upside and downside surprises in construction and industry, and a series of disappointments in retail sales. The new round of stricter lockdown measures introduced in March didn’t help the recovery either. All things considered, we think that Hungary was unable to avoid a W-shaped recovery. We see a 0.8% quarter-on-quarter drop in 1Q21 but the risks are skewed to the upside.

The Russian balance of payments data for April, to be released next Wednesday, could be an important data point for ruble watchers. We believe the strong oil price environment, some recovery in oil production volumes, and the extended ban of foreign tourism to Turkey, one of the most popular resort destinations, should be supportive, but signs of a fast recovery in imports and continued private capital outflows are risk factors. In other news, industrial output for April, also due to be released on Wednesday, should point to a spike in the annual growth rate to around 5% or higher, but that’s mostly due to the low base effect, as April 2020 was the first month of strict Covid-19 lockdowns, with IP dropping by 4.7% YoY.