HungaryTrends – A wrap-up of the last week’s business and finance
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Following are some of the top business and finance news from the past week:
2018 RECORD YEAR IN HUNGARIAN TOURISM!
Hungary drew a record number of foreign visitors last year, 650,000 more than in 2017, the director-general of the Hungarian Tourism Agency (Magyar Turisztikai Ügynökség – MTÜ) said. Read more details HERE.
S+P UPGRADES HUNGARY TO ‘BBB’; OUTLOOK ‘STABLE’
S+P Global Ratings upgraded Hungary’s sovereign rating to ‘BBB’, two notches over the investment grade threshold, with a ‘stable’ outlook. “The upgrade reflects Hungary’s sound growth prospects, supported by high private savings and real wage gains sustaining domestic demand, as well as the ongoing expansion of export capacity in the automotive and services sectors,” S+P said in its rationale for the ratings action.
ORBÁN PROPOSES MATOLCSY AS NBH HEAD FOR ANOTHER TERM
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán will propose György Matolcsy for another term as governor of the National Bank of Hungary (NBH), the PM’s press chief said. Under the watch of Matolcsy, a former economy minister whose hallmark is unorthodox, albeit effective, policy, the central bank base rate has been brought to a historic low. He has also overseen a reversal in corporate lending trends supported by the NBH’s Funding for Growth Scheme, and he helped coordinate the conversion of retail FX mortgages into forints, reducing household debt by some 1,000 billion forints.