LatinNews Daily - 22 January 2025

*Honduras’ central bank (BCH) has released new figures that show that the country’s monthly indicator of economic activity (Imae) was up by 2.9% in November 2024 compared with the same month of 2023, while accumulated growth in the first eleven months of 2024 was 3.9%. This compares with year-on-year growth of 4.3% in October 2024, while accumulated growth in the first ten months of the year was 4.1%. Key contributors to accumulated growth in the first eleven months of 2024 included financial intermediation, insurance, and pension funds (+11.6%); private construction (+7.2%); and electricity and water (+6.5%). Two sectors registered declines: agriculture, livestock, forestry & fishing (-0.9%) and manufacturing (-1.3%). In its latest forecast released on 18 December, the United Nations (UN) Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (Eclac) forecast that Honduras will post 3.6% GDP growth in 2024, a growth rate also registered in 2023.