Sallas accuses foreign experts of creating a negative economic climate in Greece
Recent forecasts by international experts and media about another year of deep recession in Greece have provoked an intervention by Piraeus Group head, Michalis Sallas, who said that the domestic economy can revert to growth in 2016.
The estimates by foreign analysts published by Bloomberg this week suggested that Greece’s economy will shrink by 1.8 percent this year, and in doing so have the world’s third-worst performance in 2016.
Sallas countered that the forecast is unfounded as it didn’t stem from the course and real data of the economy: “It was with great surprise that I recently watched a series of announcements by foreign analysts, in which an effort was made to create a negative, recessionary environment for the Greek economy in 2016.”
“Those forecasts are diametrically opposed to our estimates, as well as the sentiment we experience in talks with the businesspeople and foreign investors. In the recent past we have seen similar or even more extreme forecasts made by the same experts proven emphatically wrong,” stated Sallas.
He added that “the Greek economy still has many structural problems to resolve. But I believe that provided there is a completion of the [bailout] review soon and the government proceeds decisively to the implementation of the privatizations program and the new investment incentives law, the economy will respond positively and return to growth in the second half. We will therefore have a positive overall change to the gross domestic product in 2016.”
