WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. economy's stumble at the start of 2015 is dragging down the world's growth to the lowest level since the Great Recession, the International Monetary Fund said Thursday.
The IMF forecasts 3.3 percent global growth this year, down from the 3.5 percent it predicted in April. That would be slowest pace of global growth since the world economy shrank slightly in the recession year 2009. The main culprit: The American economy, world's biggest, shrank at a 0.2 percent annual rate from January to March, hurt by nasty weather. The IMF last month cut the outlook for U.S. growth to 2.5 percent in 2015, from April's 3.1 percent. The U.S. economy grew 2.4 percent in 2014.
The fund expects the U.S. economy to grow 3 percent in 2016.
IMF research chief Olivier Blanchard downplayed the wider economic impact of the Greek debt crisis and the possibility that Greece could be forced to abandon the euro currency.