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CEE: Czech National Bank to confirm stable rates
After a busy two weeks in Poland and Hungary, the main focus will shift to the Czech Republic. But first, today, we will see the final GDP number for Poland for last year. On Tuesday, fourth quarter GDP for the Czech Republic will be released. On Wednesday, we'll see the Czech Republic's state budget for January and PMI numbers across the region. We expect sentiment to improve in Poland, to be unchanged in the Czech Republic, and to deteriorate in Hungary.
The Czech National Bank is scheduled to hold its first meeting of the year on Thursday. We expect rates and the FX commitment to remain unchanged. The main focus will be on the central bank's new forecast and outlook for January inflation. Thus, given the risk of higher inflation in the first quarter, we expect the tone to remain unchanged with the Bank citing "higher rates for longer" and warning that it does not "rule out a rate hike at subsequent meetings". However, we expect that rates will remain stable at least until the second quarter.
In Hungary, S&P on Friday decided to downgrade the rating by one notch to BBB- with a stable outlook, highlighting the impact on the economy due to Covid-19, the Ukrainian war, and delays in EU money flows.
The FX market in the region this week will, of course, be driven mainly by the global story and high volatility will not be a surprise. However, overall global conditions should remain positive for the region. Moreover, gas prices are testing new lows again, which is always good news for CEE. On the local front, we expect the Hungarian forint to absorb the negative shock of the downgrade and move back towards 395 EUR/HUF. In our view, the Czech koruna has the heaviest long positioning at the moment and therefore we see no room for the CNB meeting to support a move lower. On the contrary, we believe the koruna is overvalued and should move back towards 24.0 EUR/CZK.
Frantisek Taborsky
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