SEOUL, Nov. 24 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's central bank on Thursday slashed its 2023 growth outlook for the economy amid rising worries about an economic downturn caused by rapid interest rate hikes.
Bank of Korea (BOK) said after the rate-setting meeting that the economy was forecast to grow 1.7 percent in 2023. It was down from the 2.1 percent estimated in August.
The BOK estimate was lower than outlooks from the International Monetary Fund (IMF)'s 2 percent, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)'s 1.8 percent and the Korea Development Institute (KDI)'s 1.8 percent.
The BOK predicted the economy to expand 2.6 percent in 2022, unchanged from the previous estimate.
The outlook for next year's headline inflation was revised down to 3.6 percent from the previous 3.7 percent.
The forecast for this year's consumer price inflation was cut from 5.2 percent to 5.1 percent.
The BOK decided earlier in the day to raise its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points to 3.25 percent, delivering six back-to-back rate hikes for the first time. ■