Our proprietary DART (Daily Activity and Recovery Tracker) Index estimates economic activity to have eked out a minor uptick for the week ending 15th Aug-21.
Download ReportQuantEco DART Index Economic activity at a new post pandemic peak
Economic activity in Aug-21 continues to build traction at a gradual pace above the baseline of 100 (Mar-20=100). The latest DART reading marks the third consecutive week of above 100 reading. This underscores the swift and steady recovery post the second COVID wave of infections amidst state-level unlocking and COVID cases stabilizing close to ~37k at an all-India level. This should ensure sequential growth reverts to an expansion in Q2 FY22 after contracting in Q1. We estimate India’s GDP to have clocked an annualised growth of 23.0% in Q1 FY22 owing to a favourable base from last year’s nationwide lockdown, albeit concealing the 15% contraction on QoQ basis.
On the vaccination front, last week saw a daily pace of 5.3 mn doses compared to 5.2 mn in the previous week. The pace of vaccination after averaging at 4.3 mn in Jul-21 has risen to 5.0 mn in August, so far. In our estimate, the pace will have to increase to ~7 mn/day Sep-21 onwards in order to inoculate ~60% of population with the first dose by Dec-21 end. For this, a faster ramp up in supplies will have to be eventually matched by efforts to effectively enhance vaccine acceptancy on the demand side.