LONDON: Warc's latest Consensus Ad Forecast indicates that global advertising expenditure will grow more slowly in 2013 than previously thought, at 3.4%, but adspend in the BRIC nations will increase between two and three times as fast.

The Consensus Ad Forecast is based on a weighted average of adspend predictions at current prices from ad agencies, media monitoring companies, analysts, Warc's own team and other industry bodies.

The revised figure of 3.4% is a downgrade of -0.6 percentage points (pp) from an earlier forecast in January 2013. Predictions for all countries, except Japan and Australia, have been cut since then. The biggest revisions came in the European nations of Spain (-6.7pp), Italy (-7.0pp) and France (-2.1pp).

All developed nations were predicted to see below average adspend growth, while Brazil (8.1%), Russia (12.1%), India (8.4%) and China (9.7%) are anticipated to be the strongest performers in 2013.

That performance will continue into 2014, when Brazil (10.7%), Russia (10.7%), India (11.4%) and China (11.4%) will again far outpace the rest of the world, which is forecast to grow 5.4%.

All media, bar newspapers (-4.6%) and magazines (-4.3%) were predicted to record year-on-year growth in 2013.

Internet and out of home were the only channels to see their forecasts upgraded, by 0.1 and 0.2 percentage points respectively. These are also expected to be the fastest growing media during 2013, with internet's 13.9% increase the outstanding feature. Out of home's 3.1% advance is rather more modest.

"The global ad outlook for 2013 has worsened since the start of the year, significantly so in Western Europe," said Suzy Young, Data and Journals Director, Warc.

"The UK is the only ad market in the region expected to record annual growth," she added.

Data sourced from Warc