India’s economic growth hits 8.2%, the fastest in 2 years

Vendors
sell vegetables at a wholesale vegetable market in the old
quarters of Delhi January 22, 2014.
REUTERS/Ahmad Masood

• Economic growth in India was 8.2% in the second
  quarter.
• That beat expectations for 7.6% growth and surpassed
  previous quarter GDP of 7.7%.
• A strong manufacturing sector and isolation from
  ongoing trade tensions helped power growth, analysts
  say.

India’s economy expanded more than 8% between April and June from
a year earlier, as a surge in manufacturing activity and spending
powered the world’s sixth-largest economy to its fastest growth
in more than two years.  

Gross domestic product in the country grew 8.2% year-over-year
last quarter, according to
government data out Friday, up from 7.7% in the first three
months of 2018. Analysts had forecast 7.6% growth. India is the
world’s fastest-growing economy and expanding more quickly than
China, which reported 6.7% economic growth in the second
quarter. 

CLSA analyst Christopher Wood noted resilience in the Indian
stock market could signal the economy is accelerating at a time
when many other markets in Asia may be near cyclical peaks.
Isolation from an ongoing global trade war could be behind recent
strength, he added. 

“One reason why is that India, as primarily a domestic-driven
economy, is clearly much less exposed to Trump-driven trade
concerns,” Wood said. 

Growth also surpassed forecasts by the Reserve Bank of India,
which has been grappling with a
broad emerging market currency sell-off that has helped send
the rupee
to all-time lows. The central bank raised its benchmark rate by
50 basis points to 6.5% at its past two policy meetings.