Estonian Economy Remains In Recession

(RTTNews) - The Estonian economy continued to contract in the third quarter despite showing some signs of improvement, preliminary figures from Statistics Estonia showed on Friday.

Gross domestic product decreased 0.7 percent year-over-year in the third quarter, the same pace of decline as in the second quarter. GDP has been falling since the second quarter of 2024.

Among the activities, construction had a strong negative impact on the economy, followed by manufacturing. Meanwhile, the biggest positive contributor after two years was again information and communication, where value added grew by 7.3 percent.

On the expenditure side, private consumption fell 2.1 percent, while government consumption showed a modest growth. Data showed that investments declined notably by 15.2 percent.

"However, this drop in investments is not a sign of a worsening economic outlook, but the level of investment in the third quarter of last year was unusually high," Robert Muursepp, team lead of national accounts at Statistics Estonia, said.

Net exports were positive for the fourth quarter in a row, as exports remained at the same level as in the third quarter of last year, while imports fell by 1.3 percent. 

The seasonally and working-day adjusted GDP decreased by 0.6 percent from the third quarter of 2023 and remained unchanged from the June quarter.