The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has revised upwards its growth forecast for the UAE in 2025 to 5.1%, up from its earlier forecast of 4.2% growth in April, according to the fund’s latest World Economic Outlook (pdf). The Fund maintained its 4% outlook for 2024.

ICYMI- The IMF revised upward its 2024 growth forecast for the UAE to 4% in May. The fund had previously penciled in 3.5% growth for 2024 in its World Economic Update report in April.

How this compares: The Central Bank of the UAE is more optimistic about growth in 2025, penciling in 6.2% growth in June supported by the Opec+’s increase of the UAE’s oil production quota. The World Bank expects economic growth to accelerate to 4.1% in 2025, while Oxford Economics is more optimistic, saying the domestic economy could grow 5.6% next year.

The UAE is bucking the global trend: The IMF revised downwards its forecast for global growth next year to 3.2%, a 0.1 percentage point downward revision from its July estimate, on the back of escalating geopolitical tensions and trade protectionism.

The IMF sees inflation growing at a 2.3% clip in 2024 before decelerating to 2.1% next year, a slight upward revision from the 2.1% it forecast in May and the 2.0% forecast in April.

The current account surplus will come in at 8.8%, a few notches below the 9% penciled into its May forecast.

The broader Middle East and Central Asia region is expected to grow at a 2.4% clip in 2024, before seeing growth accelerate to 3.9% in 2025, according to the report.

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