The global economy is starting the new year on a more optimistic note, although this does not guarantee that 2023 will end up that way, Bloomberg reported.

A number of factors - an earlier-than-expected rebound in China's economy, a warmer-than-usual winter in energy-deficient Europe and a steady fall in inflation in the U.S. - have combined to dispel the gloom that gripped financial markets in 2022 and give hope that the world can avoid a recession.

Data released Friday showed that the U.K. economy unexpectedly expanded in November, and Germany also avoided a contraction in late 2022.

But with the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank still pushing to raise interest rates, the risk of an end-of-year slowdown cannot be ignored, especially if inflation turns out to be sticky and does not fall as much as central banks want.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. chief economist Jan Hatzius is betting that they will do as well as investors. Emerging-market stocks are on the rise and corporate-bond prices are rising in hopes that the global economy will emerge from the worst inflation in decades without a downturn.

There are several reasons for cautious optimism. Global price pressures are easing, partly because of slowing global growth, but also because of the normalization of supply chains, which have been undermined by the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. U.S. consumer prices rose 6.5% in December from a year earlier, up from a June high of 9.1%.

Lower inflation will support the purchasing power of consumers, who have been constrained by rising prices for much of the past year, especially for necessities such as energy, food and rent. It will also allow central banks to cut rate hikes, easing investor fears that policymakers will go too far and break something in the markets.