Two of the largest U.S. retailers recently reported strong Q4 results. Sales at Amazon rose +8.2% y/y, and same-store sales at Walmart rose +4.2% y/y, but its online sales leapt +43% y/y.

After the slight decline in economic output in the third quarter, real GDP increased only marginally by +0.02% q/q in seasonally adjusted terms in the final quarter of 2018.

Industrial production dropped for the fourth consecutive month in December, with the pace of contrac¬tion accelerating to -9.8% y/y (seasonally adjusted; -6.6% in November).

In just two weeks, the South African growth rate for 2018 will be published. It will likely show a return to the low growth registered in 2016 (+0.6%) despite a sizeable fiscal deficit (-4.2% of GDP in 2018).

Today, the government will present the pension reform to Congress, starting a lengthy, politically tense process.

First estimates indicate that real GDP growth in the group of 11 EU members in the CEE region came in at +4.2% y/y in Q4 (unchanged from Q3), taking full-year 2018 growth to an estimated +4.3%.

Senegal’s GDP per capita grew by +17% between 2013 and 2018.

USD-denominated exports rose by +9.1% y/y in January (after a -4.4% decline in December) mainly driven by demand from the EU (+15.3%) and ASEAN (+12.5%).