Romania: Inflation soars in October
Consumer prices soared 1.78% over the previous month in October, coming in well above September’s 0.84% rise and logging the highest print since May 2005. The jump was largely driven by rising prices for food and non-food goods.
Inflation climbed to 7.9% in October from 6.3% in September. October’s result represented the joint highest inflation rate since June 2011. Accordingly, the trend pointed up, with annual average inflation coming in at 4.1% in October (September: 3.6%). Commenting on the inflation outlook, Valentin Tataru, chief economist at ING, said:
“An optimist could say that the higher inflation prints now mean stronger disinflationary base effects next year. There is some truth to that, but that’s not how inflation will stay sustainably lower. We believe that the NBR will need to continue with its rate hiking cycle until it reaches a terminal rate of 3.00% in mid-2022. If given the chance, we think that the central bank would like to do less tightening, but the context doesn’t seem to help their wishful dovish stance. In parallel, the FX rate will remain tightly managed and the 4.95 level should hold for most of 2022 as well.”