The peak of Poland’s economic cycle has already passed, according to Marta Petka-Zagajewska, head of the macroeconomic analysis team at PKO BP, who told PAP Biznes the turning point came around the turn of 2025-2026.
Growth seen easing
PKO BP expects full-year GDP growth of 3.6 percent for the current year, a forecast revised up by 0.1 percentage points. Growth is estimated to have slowed to 3.3 percent year-on-year in the third quarter, a preliminary figure, down from 4.1 percent in the second quarter. For 2027 as a whole, PKO BP forecasts GDP growth of 2.8 percent.
Upside risks to growth could come from improving global conditions and an AI boom, Petka-Zagajewska said. The bank’s base scenario assumes the government’s “Ceny Paliwa Niżej” fuel price package expires at the end of the current year, and that Middle East tensions do not escalate further, allowing oil prices to enter what she called a very slow downtrend. She flagged 2027, an election year, as a risk factor that could prolong fuel price measures, while household tariff changes are assumed to stay in single digits.
Inflation path and rates
PKO BP forecasts CPI inflation at 3.6-3.7 percent year-on-year by the end of the current year, before rising to 4.4 percent in January. Inflation is then expected to temporarily climb back above 4 percent in June 2027, before easing to 2.8 percent by the end of 2027. Inflation is projected to return within the central bank’s target band in mid-2027.
Against that backdrop, PKO BP expects the Monetary Policy Council’s first move to be a rate cut, arriving as inflation settles back inside the target range from July 2027. US annual inflation stood at 3.7 percent in September, near a 31-day high, though that reading has no direct bearing on the Polish outlook described by Petka-Zagajewska.
Source: PKO BP | Data: FRED — St. Louis Fed
