In South Korea, real GDP growth reached 3.1% in Q4 18, driven by the set of supportive measures implemented by the government. Real GDP growth should slow in the first quarter of 2019: the direct effect of US-China trade tensions would be limited (as intermediate goods destined for the US but exported via China account for a small proportion of its total exports), but the indirect effects could be significant for Korea’s export sector, particularly semiconductors. All in all, we expect real GDP growth to slow to 2.5% in 2019 (after 3.1% in 2018).
Index South Korea
