Inflation to peak in Q3
PRICES of major commodities may peak sometime in the third quarter following a slowdown in June, but it is still possible that full-year inflation may be lower than the 4.7 percent average forecast, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said on Thursday.
“We already lowered our forecast (during the last monetary policy stance meeting) to 4.7 percent from 5.1 percent. We may lower it again on the next meeting. We will study the data we have,” BSP Gov. Amando Tetangco said.
At the start of the year, the BSP said that inflation for this year would be within the target range of 3.5 percent to 5.5 percent, and set a forecast average of 4.7 percent for the full year.
But the BSP is not counting out the possibility of inflation going higher in the coming months even if it went down to 3.9 percent in June.
On Tuesday, the National Statistics Office said the headline inflation rate decelerated to 3.9 percent in June from 4.3 percent in May, further bolstering the central bank’s view that inflation this year will be “fairly safe.”
“June inflation at 3.9 percent is just a tad above the lower end of our forecast range for the month and nearly half a percentage point lower than the level in May of 4.3 percent. This inflation path therefore puts the full year inflation targets for 2010 and 2011 fairly safe,” Tetangco said. (PIA-Bohol)
