The Greek economy shrank 14.1% from April to June, covering most of the period it was in lockdown. It was the sharpest economic decline in at least 25 years, revised data showed.
On a yearly basis, output contracted 11.7% compared with the second quarter, confirming official expectations that for the year, gross domestic product would drop more than 10%.
"A decline in tourism by about 75 percent is reflected in the yearly data," said Nikos Magginas, chief economist at the National Bank of Greece.
Tourism is a key money maker, representing about 18% of output and employing one in five people.
Government support measures, along with spending deferred from the locked-down second quarter, supported the quarterly expansion, Magginas said.
The contraction is still bad news for Greece, which had, until the pandemic appeared, hoped to turn a page on years of economic hardship.
The country lost a quarter of its output during a decade-long financial crisis that required three international bailouts between 2010 and 2015.
A second nationwide lockdown, not as stringent as the first, is now in place following a surge in COVID-19 cases from October onwards. Greece has recorded fewer cases and deaths of COVID than most countries; by Thursday, it had 111,537 cases registered since February, and 2,706 deaths.
The present lockdown is due to run until Dec. 14.
(Writing by Michele Kambas, editing by Larry King)
By Lefteris Papadimas and Renee Maltezou
