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An unknown individual has made headlines in the Czech Republic, after the country’s prime betting company, SAZKA, announced that the winner of a Europe-wide lottery’s billion-crown jackpot was Czech. His luck may be seen by some as two-fold, because the win came before the expected arrival of new legislation taxing lottery winners.

The Czech Republic’s economic growth is expected to continue at a rate of around 2.5 percent, the International Monetary Fund predicted in a press release on Thursday. Inflation is expected to go down and unemployment levels will rise. The head of the organisation also warned of the large impact that American tolls on European products would have on the Czech economy.

Prague is catching up with West European real estate markets, the daily e15 reports, citing a new survey released by PriceWaterhouseCooper and the Urban Land Institute, carried out among developers and investors. According to the 2019 report, Prague is one of the 20 most sought after cities in Europe for real estate purchases.

The prices of basic commodities in Czech shops continue to rise. According to data released by the Czech Statistics Office, consumer prices in May increased by 0.6 percent compared to April, driven mainly by higher prices of food, specifically fruit and vegetables.

Up to 25,000 people could be living in Prague 7‘s Bubny neighbourhood, at least according to a study commissioned by Prague City Hall, whose results were announced at a press conference of Tuesday.

The unemployment rate in the Czech Republic fell to a new low in May, at 2.6 percent down from 2.7 percent the previous month. The drop was in line with expectations and is attributed to seasonal work.

The German Central Bank has published a prediction on the country’s expected economic growth for 2019. It lowered its expectations from 1.6 percent to 0.6 percent. The Czech manufacturing sector is very dependent on German economic strength and Germany is also the Czech Republic’s largest trading partner. However, analysts questioned by the Czech News Agency say that changes in the forecast were expected and will not affect the Czech economy.

Prague inhabitants with an average salary would have to work for nearly fifteen years for a flat of approximately seventy square metres, if they didn’t have any other expenses, suggests a study by the developer company Central group. Just a year ago, Praguers needed to work less than 14 years to acquire a flat, while in 2014 it was less than ten years.

Experts from the Czech University of Life Sciences are working to create a landscape with elements to ensure that the land can withstand drought and floods. If it proves successful, the project should serve as a model for areas elsewhere in the Czech Republic and Europe.

Czech breweries exported a record 5.16 million hectolitres of beer last year, an increase of over 11 percent in 2018, the Czech Beer and Malt Association reported this week. For the first time in history, the volume of beer in tanks and kegs surpassed bottled and canned beer.