Consumers continue to drive growth in Chile

Last month’s slowdown in Chilean retail sales growth, coupled with a pick-up in the manufacturing sector, will help to ease mounting concerns about the unbalanced nature of recent growth. But in reality this is only one month’s data. The bigger picture remains that while the overall pace of growth should impress over the next year or so it will be two-speed, with domestic demand booming and the noncopper export sector struggling to keep up.