He Central Bank of the Dominican Republic (BCRD) In the interest of keeping economic agents and public opinion in general duly informed, and as part of the institutional commitment to transparency and the timely disclosure of data under its responsibility, it reports the preliminary results of economic activity as of August 2024.
He monthly indicator of economic activity (IMAE) registered an expansion of 5.6% during the month of August of this year, thus accumulating an average interannual growth of 5.1% in January-August 2024.
This behavior has taken place in an environment of price stability in which inflation has remained this year in the lower part of the mint range of 4.0% ± 1.0% as a result of the monetary and fiscal policies implemented, which has allowed the risk factors for the performance of the Dominican economy to be overcome in a timely manner.
In this sense, it is important to point out that the trajectory observed by economic activity shows the resilience of the national productive apparatus in the current global context, in which the expectations of economic agents have been affected by the uncertainty associated with geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, which has been reflected in greater volatility in raw material prices.
Despite the global outlook, the United States of America (USA), the country’s main trading partner, has shown positive signs in its main macroeconomic indicators, highlighting the favorable behavior of economic activity, as well as the trend of inflation towards the objective. of 2% established by the Federal Reserve (FED).
In this context, supported by these advances, said institution decided in its most recent meeting in September to reduce its reference interest rate by 50 basis points (bps), continuing to monitor the short-term evolution of the outlook and the risk balance to adequately determine the next adjustments.
This flexibility provides greater freedom to implement monetary policies at the domestic level that support economic growth without compromising the inflation goal.
In addition, the expansion of the IMAE in January-August places the Dominican Republic as the economy with the greatest year-on-year increase compared to its Latin American peers, according to the latest information available to date published by the countries.
Likewise, this result is in line with the forecasts of the different international organizations, whose projections point to an expansion around the potential and place the country as a leader in terms of growth of economic activity in the region by the end of 2024.
The variation interannual of 5.1% in January-August 2024 is due to the performance of activities such as construction (4.9%) and manufacturing of free zones (6.6%), highlighting that exports under this regime amounted to US$5,691.4 million in the aforementioned period.
Likewise, service activities as a whole showed a cumulative increase of 5.4% compared to the same period of the previous year, among which hotels, bars and restaurants (7.1%), transportation and storage (5.9%), real estate and rental activities stand out. (5.8%) and communications (5.3%).
It should be noted that, in the particular case of the IMAE expansion of 5.6% in the month of August, all activities registered positive interannual rates.
Below, those that showed the greatest growth stand out: financial intermediation (8.7%), mining (8.5%), free zone manufacturing (8.1%), construction (6.9%), local manufacturing (6.8%), commerce (6.2% ) and transportation (6.0%).
Regarding financial intermediation activity, it presented a year-on-year increase in its real added value of 8.1% in January-August, with this result influenced by the 15.2% expansion of credit granted to the private sector in national currency, equivalent to RD$232,425.2 million. additional with respect to August of the previous year.
An important aspect to highlight is that mining grew 8.5% in the month of August 2024, supported by the increase in gold production in the country’s main deposit.
Likewise, construction, which has a significant multiplier effect and drag on other economic sectors, exhibited an interannual variation of 6.9% in the aforementioned month, which is reflected in the increase in sales volumes of the main inputs used in said sector. .
It is important to point out that the added value of the hotels, bars and restaurants activity experienced an interannual variation of 0.9% in August, largely explained by the moderation of the growth rate (1.5%) in the arrival of non-resident passengers by air. in the aforementioned month, due to the statistical effect of the comparison base having registered a record in the arrival of non-resident foreigners in August 2023.
In accumulated terms, the added value of the sector grew 7.1% in January-August 2024, supported by the total number of passengers received in the country by the different airport terminals, which reached 5,961,484 tourists, for an increase of 7.5% compared to the same period of the previous year.
When adding those who arrived by sea, there were a total of 7,760,518 visitors in the aforementioned period, 9.5% more than the first eight months of 2023.
Finally, the Dominican economy is in a good position to maintain a growth rate around its potential, taking into account the strength of its macroeconomic fundamentals, the resilience of the productive sectors and the improvement in country risk indicators in the international markets.
