Swiss Growth Unexpectedly Slows on Weak Government Demand
- First-quarter GDP rises 0.1%, estimate was for 0.3% increase
- Economy helped by private households, construction investment
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Switzerland’s economy barely grew in the first quarter as government spending fell for the first time in a year.
The slowdown to 0.1 percent followed expansion of 0.4 percent in the last three months of 2015 and fell short of the 0.3 percent growth that economists had forecast. The report published Wednesday by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs in Bern also showed that government expenditure dropped 0.8 percent.