NBS: Serbia's outlook improved from stable to positive

BELGRADE - After Standard & Poor’s and Fitch, the world's third most renowned rating agency, Moody’s, has improved Serbia’s outlook from stable to positive, affirming the ratings at Ba2, the National Bank of Serbia (NBS) says.

"The move marks the continuation of positive assessments of macroeconomic developments in Serbia by eminent institutions, as well as estimates of its favourable growth prospects.

In its report, Moody’s emphasises that the prospects of Serbia’s GDP growth proved to exceed their expectations, attesting to the strength of our economy," the central bank said in a statement.

"The fact that all three of the world’s most important rating agencies have improved the outlook for Serbia’s rating in recent months only shows that in the previous years we responded appropriately to all challenges and that, along with mitigating the negative effects of external shocks, we developed our economy and worked on further improvement of the standard of living of all our citizens. Such a policy has produced results, but at the same time it is a guarantee that in the future we will continue to work on preserving overall stability and a favourable investment and business environment, which places us in the group of fast-growing economies”, NBS Governor Jorgovanka Tabakovic said.

"The agency expects Serbia’s economic growth to accelerate this and the next year, with real GDP growth coming at 3.8 pct in 2024 and 4.2 pct in 2025.

Growth should be supported by further disinflation, favourable trends in the labour market, robust domestic demand and the ongoing investment cycle.

The agency expects a positive impact from the Leap Into the Future - Serbia Expo 2027 programme, which aims to raise public investment to 7.5 pct of GDP by 2027," the NBS said.

"All decision-makers in Serbia are absolutely committed to further improving the domestic economic environment, increasing the credit rating and reaching the investment grade level, which will provide an additional assurance that Serbia is a country with a high certainty of investment, which foreign investors have believed in for years and which they confirm with their projects and investments”, Tabakovic said.