WASHINGTON, April 15 (UPI) -- The decline in oil prices has led to a subdued outlook for the global economy, with importers like China and exporters alike feeling the impact, the IMF said.
Brent crude oil prices traded Wednesday at around $59 per barrel, a substantial discount from the mid-June 2014 price above the $110 per barrel mark. The steep drop has impacted capital growth in countries that rely heavily on oil for government revenues.
Olivier Blanchard, a research director at the International Monetary Fund, said the decline in the price of oil has redistributed real income for oil exporters and importers alike.
"The early evidence suggests that, in oil importers, from the United States, to the euro area, to China, and to India, the increase in real income is increasing spending," he wrote in a Tuesday briefing. "Oil exporters have cut spending but to a smaller extent: many have substantial financial reserves and are in a position to reduce spending slowly."
In its review of the global economy, the IMF said economic growth for 2015 would be relatively unchanged from the previous year. Beneath the average, the IMF found growth would be uneven, as advanced economies expand while developing economies shrink.
Blanchard said the economic factors at play are "unusually complex." Some factors, like the decline in the value of the ruble, the currency in oil-rich Russia, are easily visible, though other factors, like slow capital growth in emerging economies, are less apparent.
"It would be wrong to speak, as some have done, of stagnation, but prospects are more subdued," he said. "And more subdued prospects lead, in turn, to lower spending and lower growth today."
