Analysts: Economy contracts by 3.4% in Q1

The economy remained in recession in the first quarter of the year, with the GDP down by 3.4% in real terms compared with the similar period of 2009, and by 0.5% against the last quarter of 2009, according to analyst estimates.
Romania is still in recession territory, with quarterly economic growth most likely to be postponed until the second half of the year.
Based on seasonally adjusted data, the GDP fell by 0.5% in the first quarter of the year against the fourth quarter of 2009, according to an internal survey conducted by the Association of Financial-Banking Analysts in Romania.
Although positive signals emerged in the real economy in March, they did not manage to offset the weak performance of the previous few months.
The wide majority of economic analysts were disappointed in the industrial production, trade, and constructions figures for February, which continued to see declines. As a result, they revised forecasts for this year's economic growth downwards, to under 1%.
For the entire year the IMF now expects the economy to stagnate, but does not rule out a contraction of up to 0.5%