Norway’s economy barely expanded in the fourth quarter as consumer spending held up amid a plunge in oil prices. Mainland gross domestic product, which excludes oil, gas and shipping, grew 0.1 percent, after being revised to unchanged in the third quarter, Statistics Norway said on Tuesday. Mainland growth was seen at 0.1 percent in a Bloomberg survey. Total output shrank 1.2 percent. Recession “is absolutely a risk,” said Erik Bruce, a senior economist at Nordea Bank in Oslo. “While we see growth at around zero, there’s a good chance we will see negative figures, maybe even two quarters in a row.” Mainland growth at the end of last year is below Norges Bank’s estimates, which means the central bank will act on its signal to cut rates to 0.5 percent in March, according to economists at Nordea and DNB. The krone weakened 0.1 percent to 9.6251 per euro as […]