Major countries in the world announce GDP for the third quarter of 2024

Major economies in the world have recently announced their third-quarter results. China and the United States have continued their recovery momentum, and ASEAN countries have performed even better, but some economies have performed below expectations.

Entering the fourth quarter, analysts warn that the global economy, which has weakened its growth momentum, needs to be alert to a major risk. If it cannot be effectively dealt with, it may bring huge losses equivalent to the combined GDP of Japan and Germany.

In the first three quarters, China’s GDP grew by 4.8% year-on-year. From a month-on-month perspective, after seasonal adjustment, China’s GDP in the third quarter grew by 0.9% month-on-month, and the month-on-month growth rate has been positive for nine consecutive quarters, and the economy has maintained a stable and positive trend.

Especially under the “relay” of stock and incremental policies, China’s major economic indicators such as industrial production, investment, and consumption have shown positive changes since September. The latest October China Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) returned to the expansion range after a lapse of 5 months, which also shows that the economic prosperity level continues to recover and improve.

In the third quarter of this year, the US real GDP grew by 2.8% on an annualized basis, lower than market expectations. Personal consumption expenditures, which account for about 70% of the total US economy, grew by 3.7% in the quarter, an increase of 0.9 percentage points from the second quarter. Non-residential fixed asset investment, which reflects corporate investment, grew by 3.3%, a decrease of 0.6 percentage points from the second quarter.

The GDP of the eurozone and the EU both grew by 0.9% year-on-year in the third quarter. Although the economic data of the eurozone in the third quarter was slightly better than expected, the overall performance during the year was lower than expected. From a country perspective, the GDP of Germany, the largest economy in the EU, grew by 0.2% quarter-on-quarter in the third quarter, while the GDP of France and Spain grew by 0.4% and 0.8% quarter-on-quarter respectively during the same period.

In Asia, ASEAN countries also performed well. Among them, Vietnam’s GDP grew by 7.4% year-on-year in the third quarter, the strongest quarterly performance in two years. Malaysia’s GDP grew by 5.3% year-on-year in the third quarter, exceeding market expectations. Singapore’s GDP grew by 4.1% year-on-year in the third quarter, a significantly higher increase than the 2.9% in the second quarter.

In addition, South Korea’s GDP grew slightly by 0.1% quarter-on-quarter in the third quarter, lower than the official quarterly forecast previously released. Although it has escaped the negative growth in the second quarter, the Bank of Korea has recently lowered its full-year economic growth forecast to 2.2% to 2.3%, lower than the previous forecast of 2.4%, due to the significant slowdown in exports.

The China Banking Research Institute warned that the new tariff measures will distort global trade and investment activities and trigger the division of the global economy and supply chain. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that the global economic and supply chain division caused by trade protectionism is costly, and may reduce global economic output by up to about 7%, which is equivalent to reducing the combined GDP of Japan and Germany, seriously damaging global economic growth and stability.

Despite this, the overall performance of global trade this year is likely to be better than in 2023. According to the WTO’s October forecast, global merchandise trade volume will increase by 2.7% year-on-year in 2024, a significant improvement from the 1.2% decline in 2023.