Emerging Europe Growth Will Speed Up in 2013, IMF Forecasts - by Agnes Lovasz

Emerging European economies will grow at a faster pace next year, driven by a recovery in the crisis- hit euro area, the region’s main export market, the International Monetary Fund said. 

The region will grow 2.6 percent next year, compared with an estimated 2 percent in 2012, “largely owing to improving conditions elsewhere in Europe,” the Washington-based lender said today in its World Economic Outlook.

The euro region is the top destination for emerging Europe’s exports and the main source of its investment and bank financing. Growth has slowed as the euro area’s economic slump deepened and foreign lenders cut support to their units to repair balance sheets. Still, emerging Europe is perceived as less risky based on credit-default swaps than debt-ridden nations using the euro, the IMF said.

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