Highlights of the World Economic Outlook:

  • IMF revises 2014 global growth forecast to 3.7% vs 3.6% in October
  • IMF raises forecast for advanced economies to 2.2% from 2.0%
  • IMF forecast for emerging markets unchanged at +5.1%
  • US forecast raised to 2.8% from 2.6% on smaller fiscal drag
  • 2015 US forecast at 3.0%
  • Sees downside risk of very low inflation that could turn to deflation on a negative shock to economic activity
  • China forecast raised to 7.5% from 7.3%
  • Says China must do more to shift growth towards consumption
  • Japan GDP 2014 forecast raised to 1.7% from 1.2%
  • Canada forecast unchanged at 2.2%
  • Full text (pdf)

Last week Lagarde said the global growth forecast would be hiked so the upgrade was expected and is a bit disappointing, given that it’s only one tick. I expected to see more talk about deflation because Lagarde spoke about it last week but it’s only mentioned in passing as a downside risk.