Since IBO’s recent article on 2015 economic forecasts (see IBO 1/15/15), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has issued a revision of its October 2014 “World Economic Outlook.” According to the update, which was released earlier this month, the factors influencing the change are the drop in oil prices, the economic downturn in major economies other than the US, the appreciation of the dollar, and the increase of interest rates and risk-spread yields in the economies of many emerging markets. The IMF’s revised predictions for select regions and countries are presented in the table below.

Predictions of overall growth in advanced economies remains largely unchanged in the IMF’s revision, but divergence between the US, and the euro area and Japan is expected to increase. Slower growth is projected in emerging and developing economies due to a decline in investment growth in China, the impact of oil prices and geopolitical conflict in Russia, and lower-than-expected growth for commodity exporters overall.