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Latest Development: Headline inflation rose in the capital Colombo to 1.5% y-o-y in April from 0.9% in March. One reason was that transport prices flipped back into inflation at 5.0% y-o-y, from 2.0% deflation. The Colombo data suggest that national headline inflation rose in April, but remained within the Central Bank of Sri Lanka’s (CBSL) 3-7%

Key View: 

• We think that Thailand will now run a wider surplus of 2.9% of GDP compared to our previous forecast of 2.6%. Still, this will be just shy of the pre-Covid size. 
• Global demand prospects are improving which bodes well for Thailand’s export performance. 
• The one key factor holding back the country’s external health is tourism. Even if

Latest Development: On May 1 2024, Cigalah Healthcare, a prominent Saudi Arabia-based healthcare company, entered into a collaboration with Abdi Ibrahim, a Turkiye-based pharmaceutical company. Under the agreement Cigalah Healthcare will import various pharmaceutical products including central nervous system, cardiovascular, respiratory and

Key View

• Healthcare expenditure will benefit from increased government spending despite projected below-trend GDP growth in 2024. 
• Increased digital health investment aims to create a more integrated and efficient health information system that will deepen collaboration between healthcare providers.
• Private healthcare expenditure will benefit from

Key view:  We have a positive outlook for consumer spending in the Philippines in 2024.  Easing inflationary pressures, a slightly favourable labour market and lower interest rates form the base for consumer spending growth. The key risks to this outlook include prolonged inflation; decrease in remittances, which fluctuate as a result of external

Key View

• Israel has taken over the Rafah Crossing despite Hamas accepting a ceasefire agreement. The operation will last several months and will likely worsen humanitarian conditions in Gaza and increase the civilian death toll. 
• We think that Israel’s operations in Rafah will intensify the international backlash against Israel, even from its closest

Key View

• The National Bank of Romania (NBR) maintains a hawkish policy stance compared to its peers in Central and Eastern Europe, and we retain our core expectation for it to lower its deposit rate 7.00% to 6.25% by year-end.
• We forecast that Romania’s headline inflation rate will decline gradually over the coming months, reaching an end-2024 rate

Please Note: BMI is enhancing its risk analysis with a new scoring system following its acquisition of GeoQuant, a market-leading provider of political risk data. From March 27 2024, risk scores are inverted: zero now represents the lowest risk and 100 represents the highest risk. This allows for clearer, industry-standard assessments. For further

Key View

• We expect the recovery of the Serbian economy to continue in 2024 as consumer spending rebounds. We forecast GDP to expand by 3.0% after a 2.5% expansion in 2023.   
• Declining inflation alongside a still tight labour market will likely support consumer purchasing power in 2024, allowing for a recovery of private consumption growth from 0.8%