In 2016, GEO real property market grew substantially. With a total of 89 120 transactions, the market this year surpassed 2015 by 20.2%. The highest number of sales was registered in AUG-16 & DEC-16, with 8 076 and 8 099 units respectively.

The so-called “Economic Freedom Act” (EFA), which has been a matter of public discussion in recent weeks, refers to two pieces of legislation: (i) a Constitutional amendment from 2010, which requires a referendum for introducing new taxes or increasing the tax rate, and (ii) the Law on Economic Freedom (2011), in force since 2013, setting a number of additional restrictions to government fiscal policy (Table 1).

On Monday, March 6 ISET hosted its graduate Robizon Khubulashvili, a Ph.D. Student of Pennsylvania State University. Robizon presented his working paper entitled “Endogenous Team Formation Among Competitors”.

The Khachapuri Index has declined in February, with the average cost of cooking one standard Imeretian khachapuri reaching 3.66 GEL. This is 0.2% lower month-on-month (compared to January 2017), and 6.2% higher year-on-year (compared to February 2016).

The above quote seems to fit the state of affairs in the European Union fairly well, as the EU’s crisis is continuing, getting deeper, and engulfing more actors than when it started. To name a few well-known events and stats: Greece probably had the first meaningful kick-off in the chain of developments when it faced threats to stability in its own financial system at the end of 2009. At that time, an unreported estimated deficit jumped from 7% of GDP to the first 13%, and then stabilized at 15% as the "new normal."