Gross Domestic Product (GDP), in real terms, recorded a year-on-year rate of change of 2.5% in the first quarter of 2023 (3.2% in the previous quarter). The contribution of domestic demand to the year-on year growth rate of GDP remained positive, although lower than that observed in the precedent quarter, due to the deceleration of private consumption and the decline in investment, determined by a negative contribution from the changes in inventories, with an acceleration in exports of goods and services and a slowdown in imports of goods and services. As a result, the contribution of net external demand was higher than in the previous quarter. In the first quarter of 2023, a significant deceleration in the import deflator was observed, more intense than the slowdown in the export deflator, leading to gains in terms of trade, for the first time since the first quarter of 2021. 

Compared to the fourth quarter of 2022, GDP increased by 1.6% in volume (0.3% growth in the previous quarter), reflecting the positive contribution of net external demand (after being negative in the fourth quarter), largely resulting from the dynamism of exports, while the domestic demand contribution turned negative.