Moldova's economy in charts: inflation, exchange rate, GDP, wages

Gross domestic product adds up everything the economy produces in a period: goods, services, investment. When real GDP grows, jobs appear and incomes rise; when it falls for two quarters in a row, that is a recession. Moldova publishes quarterly GDP with a lag of roughly one hundred days — the Eurostat series below is the freshest available anywhere. IMF projections for the coming years appear on the chart as hollow, clearly-labelled columns so they cannot be mistaken for actual data.

The average gross wage across the economy has passed 15,000 lei per reporting quarter, but the average hides wide gaps between sectors and regions. The ILO unemployment rate measures, through a survey, how many people are actively looking for work. Mind the jump: from 2026 the labour-force survey uses the population recalculated after the 2024 census, and the rate climbed from 2.9% to 10.4% — a statistical correction, not a sudden loss of jobs. The two series are not directly comparable.

Moldova imports roughly three times more than it exports — a chronic trade deficit, visible in the lower panel of the chart. The gap is largely covered by remittances and external financing. Exports are dominated by agri-food products, automotive cables and textiles; imports by energy, machinery and consumer goods. Both series come from the NBS monthly, with a lag of about two months behind the reporting period.

Remittances — the money Moldovans working abroad send home — are one of the country's most important sources of foreign currency and a direct social buffer: they flow into consumption, construction and children's education. The current account nevertheless stays in deficit, balanced by foreign investment and borrowing. The chart below uses the NBM's monthly series; the cards and the matrix also track the IMF's quarterly series, which updates on a different calendar.

Moldova's government debt remains moderate by European standards — around a third of GDP — but it is rising: the budget consistently spends more than it collects, and the difference is borrowed. The IMF projects debt of about 42.5% of GDP by 2031. The sovereign ratings from Moody's, S&P and Fitch sum up how risky creditors consider that borrowing. On the revenue side, Moldova applies flat 12% rates for both corporate tax and personal income tax.