Sweden facing a period of slower economic growth

STOCKHOLM, Oct 28 (Xinhua): Sweden is facing a period of slower economic growth and rising unemployment rates after an unusually persistent period of financial growth, Swedish Television reported on Saturday.

According to the National Institute on Economic Research, Sweden's growth rate will peak at 2.4 per cent this year and then come to a halt in 2019.

Moreover, while the unemployment rate is expected to continue to sink in the coming year and dip to 6.2 per cent, it will then start to rise, the Institute's latest prognosis states.

"According to our estimates, we are at the peak of the economic boom now, even if it is hard to give an exact timing for that," said Ylva Heden Westerdahl, head of forecasting at the National Institute on Economic Research, a state agency.

However, analyses diverge among different forecasters, with the Riksbank, Sweden's Central Bank, predicting that the unemployment rate will hit bottom levels this year and then begin to slowly rise as early as next year.

The last time Sweden experienced an economic boom was over a decade ago, before the 2008 financial crisis.

"If our prognoses turn out to be accurate, this will be the longest economic upturn since 1960," said Olle Holmgren, an economist at the SEB bank.

He also suggested that the instability on the Stockholm stock market, which recently fell by around 10 per cent in a month, could be an early sign of an impending financial downturn.