OSLO: Norway’s central bank left its key policy rate at 0.50 percent, as expected, but raised its forecast for inflation and the policy rate due to a stronger-than-expected effect of inflation from a weaker krone, which may then translate into higher wages next year.
Norges Bank (NB), which cut its rate by 25 basis points in March, said inflation had been “unexpectedly high” in recent months while there are also signs that economic growth was picking up at a slightly faster pace than projected in June while house price inflation has accelerated above expectations.
“Our current assessment of the outlook suggests that the key policy rate will most likely remain at today’s level in the period ahead,” NB Governor Oeystein Olsen said, adding that the bank’s forecast still implies a slightly higher probability of a rate cut in the year ahead.
In its latest monetary policy report, the central bank raised its inflation forecast for 2016 to 3.6 percent from 3.3 percent forecast in June, the 2017 forecast to 2.6 percent from 2.2 percent, the 2018 forecast to 2.1 percent from 1.9 percent and the 2019 forecast to 1.8 percent from 1.7 percent. Norway’s inflation rate eased to 4.0 percent in August from 4.4 percent in July, mainly due to lower airfares.
NB raised its forecast for the key policy rate to average 0.6 percent this year, up from 0.5 percent, and the 2017 forecast to 0.4 percent from 0.3 percent. For 2018 the central bank also forecasts a key policy rate of 0.4 percent, rising to 0.7 percent in 2019.
The forecast for economic growth this year was raised to 0.9 percent from 0.8 percent, rising to 1.8 percent in 2017, up from 1.6 percent. For 2018 Gross Domestic Product was seen rising by an unchanged 2.1 percent while the forecast for 2019 was trimmed to 2.1 percent from 2.3 percent. Norway’s GDP grew by an annual rate of 2.5 percent in the second quarter of this year, up from 0.6 percent in the first quarter.
