Joining the club

With the introduction of the euro next year, Slovakia remains confident about the future. The figures look promising, but the stormy situation on the world’s markets gives pause for thought. How dangerous for this small country is the road that lies ahead? Mladen Petrov They say that no news is good news. This seems to be true in the case of Slovakia, which so far has not joined the list of troubled economies, such as Estonia, Latvia, Hungary and Bulgaria. From the evidence of governmental assurances and the macroeconomic figures it is highly likely that Slovakia will also remain fairly stable throughout 2009. This, however, does not mean that the country, and its real estate market, will not feel to some extent any negative effects of the global crisis.The year of the euroThis year was a very good one for Slovakia, which had one of the strongest growths in GDP in the EU. The Slovak economy grew 7.1 pct y-o-y