Hungary's economy could rebound with 4.2% GDP growth in 2021 following a 3.1% contraction this year, according to a forecast by the International Monetary Fund published on Tuesday. According to the IMF, Hungary's economy is surprisingly resilient to the crisis, with only Serbia expected to do slightly better this year in the region.

Countries in CEE acted early by closing their borders and introducing lockdown measures in response to the pandemic. Now, Austria and the Czech Republic are among the first in Europe to begin lifting their coronavirus restrictions.

The topic of Property Forum’s second online panel was the impact of the coronavirus lockdown on real estate financing in CEE. After the economic outlook of Commerzbank’s Senior EM Strategist, Tatha Ghose, four expert bankers discussed the short and long-term effects of the pandemic, such as how the lockdown affects ongoing deals, what kind of recession are we looking at and how the perception of individual asset classes may change in light of the current events. According to the experts, the recovery is expected to take longer in Hungary and Poland, while the rebound may come sooner in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

According to a new bill, Airbnb landlords in the Czech Republic have to share data with the administrative bodies. Also, the Czech Parliament plans to allow tenants without income due to the coronavirus restrictions not to pay rent until the end of July.

Most CEE governments have already introduced measures aimed at helping employed people and struggling businesses amid the coronavirus outbreak. In most countries, at least half of the average wage will be taken over by the state, up to 80% or more in certain countries. Hungary is the only country in the region where no concrete measures have been announced yet. We looked at what workers of affected companies can expect across the region.

According to the Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI), which measures the activity level of purchasing managers in a given sector, Hungary's manufacturing industry was hit much harder by the coronavirus crisis than the same sector in other CEE countries. The Polish and Czech PMI show that these economies were less affected by the downturn in March than the economy of Hungary.

As part of the fight against the coronavirus, many firms have decided to temporarily cease their production to ensure the health of their employees.

The government of Slovakia is opening some shops that have been closed for the past two weeks, while the country's parliament will debate and possibly pass the cabinet’s proposals to help companies and the self-employed. We asked Andrej Leontiev LL.M., Partner at Taylor Wessing to comment on the aid package.

Governments continue to come up with measures to help stabilize the economy. Property Forum collected the latest efforts by CEE governments to rescue businesses and individuals affected by the coronavirus crisis.

As a result of the coronavirus outbreak, most CEE/SEE countries have introduced similar moratoria provisions to the Hungarian regulations, but there are several countries that have not yet taken this step. With the help of Dr. Gergely Szalóki, Partner at Schönherr Hetényi Law Firm, we provide an overview of the regulation of these regions' countries in respect of moratoria of bank loans.