ROME: Italy’s consumer price index dropped, as expected, in January, on lower fuel prices and tumbling energy costs amid falling crude oil prices, national statistics institute Istat said Tuesday.
On a monthly basis, CPI slipped 0.4% from December, while on an annual level it decreased 0.6% from January 2014, Istat said. The annual fall was the steepest drop since September 1959, an official added.
The CPI slip was bigger than expected from a Dow Jones Newswires poll, which forecast a 0.2% fall on the month and a 0.3% drop on the year.No doubts that most of the fall we registered was a result of the energy sector,” said the same istat official.The annual core inflation rate, stripping out volatile food and energy prices, was 0.3%, weaker than the 0.6% gain registered in December.
Prices for goods shed 1.5% in January from the same month of 2014, while services added 0.5%, Istat said.January should mark a low point for Italian inflation, that will in any case stay close to zero until the end of the summer, wrote Intesa Sanpaolo SpA’s Banca IMI in a note before the figures were published.
Low inflation aids consumers but makes servicing debt more onerous. Italian households have low debt levels but companies have hefty burdens and many are struggling to obtain new bank loans.
Using the Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices, a European measure, prices tumbled 2.4% from December and fell 0.4% from January 2014, Istat said. The monthly decrease was a result of the start of the winter sales period, said the Istat official.
