IMF Increases Global Growth Forecasts, Warns of Risks

The International Monetary Fund raised its forecasts for global economic growth while warning that inflation, oil prices and the U.S. housing slowdown threaten the strongest expansion in three decades.

Global output will rise 5.1 percent this year and 4.9 percent in 2007, the fund said in its World Economic Outlook today in Singapore. Both forecasts are 0.2 percentage point higher than the April predictions. Growth was 4.9 percent in 2005.