Spanish gross domestic product growth will accelerate in the third quarter by a tenth of a percentage point or two compared with the second quarter, Economy Secretary David Vegara was quoted as saying on Saturday.
Spanish GDP growth, one of the most dynamic in the euro zone, came in at 2.6 percent year-on-year in the second quarter, after a downwardly revised 2.7 percent for the first three months.
"It is to be expected that GDP returns to growth of a tenth or two above that of the second quarter," financial daily Cinco Dias quoted Vegara as saying.
He said the government maintained a forecast of 2.8 percent growth for the full year.
"We still maintain a forecast of 2.8 percent for this year because, as international organisations show, the recovery in Europe is underway and a change in the performance of export sales is feasible."
Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero told congress this week that full-year growth would come up slightly short of a 2.8 percent forecast, although local press reported that later that day Economy Minister Pedro Solbes corrected him, saying it was still attainable.
Vegara also said in the interview that Spaniards were unlikely to be hurt by an interest rate hike.
"Raising interest rates has an impact on mortgage levels because they are massively indexed to variable rates. But the increase in employment and the rise in real income can absorb an rate rise of the size we are talking about."
He also said a booming housing market was not worrying, for the moment at least.
"The situation is not worrying; if we continue with the rates of price rises of the last three years, well then we would be worried."
Spanish house prices have more than doubled since 1999, and a recent study from valuation company Tinsa showed that new housing prices at the end of June stood 16 percent higher than at the same time last year.
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