MILANO – Inflation rises slightly again in March. According to data released this morning by Istat, the consumer price index rose by 0.1% on a monthly basis and by 1.3% on an annual basis (from 0.8% in February). The so-called “shopping cart”, i.e. the price basket of food, home and personal care goods slowed down in March on a trend basis (from +3.4% to +3.0%), as did those of products with high purchase frequency (from +2.8% in February to +2.7%). The acquired inflation for 2024 is equal to +0.6% for the general index and +1.3% for the underlying component.
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The acceleration of the inflation rate – underlines the institute – is mainly due to the attenuation on a trend basis of the decline in the prices of unregulated energy goods (from -17.2% to -10.3%) and regulated (from -17.2% to -10.3%) -18.4% to -13.8%) and, to a lesser extent, to the growth of those of transport-related services (from +3.8% to +4.4%); on the other hand, the prices of unprocessed food goods (from +4.4% to +2.6%) and tobacco (from +2.6% to +1.9%) recorded a slowdown.
In the month of March, “underlying inflation”, net of energy and fresh food, accelerates from +2.3% to +2.4%, while that net of energy goods alone decelerates from +2.6% at +2.5%.
The trend trend in the prices of goods records a less marked decline (from -0.9% to -0.1%) and that of services is slightly accelerating (from +2.9% to +3.0%), determining a decrease in the inflationary differential between the services and goods sectors (+3.1 percentage points, from +3.8 in February).
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The cyclical increase in the general index mostly reflects the growth in prices of transport-related services also due to seasonal factors (+1.4%), processed food goods and regulated energy goods (+0.7 % both) and non-durable goods (+0.4%). The effects of these increases were only partially offset by the decrease in the prices of unregulated energy goods (-1.9%) and unprocessed food goods (-0.7%).