Confident consumers

Slovakia is the 5th biggest market for Hungarian groceries: Hungarian companies realised EUR 197-million sales there in the first five months of 2016 – reported the Agricultural Economics Research Institute (AKI). Nielsen’s consumer confidence index has been growing again in Slovakia since last year: the index was at 81 points in Q2 2016 (the European average was 79 points). As for the three components of the index: 43 percent of Slovakians were more or less optimistic about their personal financial situation (European average: 41 percent); 35 percent viewed job prospects positively (Europe: 29 percent); 33 percent of Slovakian consumers said the time was right to buy what they wanted or needed (the European average was also 33 percent). Just for comparison, let’s take a look at the biggest markets for Hungarian groceries: in Q2 2016 the consumer confidence index was at 96 points in Germany (down 1 percentage point), it was 86 points in Romania (up 3 percentage points), 55 points in Italy (down 4 percentage points) and 83 points in Austria (no change).