Annual inflation fell by 1.5 percentage points (pp) to 2.1% in October, the National Statistical Institute (INE) announced on Monday, confirming the estimate presented on the 31st of last month.
The agency justifies the delay with the “base effect related to the monthly price increases recorded in October 2022 for food products (2.1%) and energy products (6.7%), with an emphasis on natural gas (77.4%) ”.
The underlying inflation indicator, which excludes unprocessed food and energy products, registered a variation of 3.5%, also declining from the 4.1% recorded in September.
In October, the variation in the energy products index was negative at -12.1%, while in the previous month it had been -4.1%, and the index for unprocessed food products slowed to 4%, a value comparable to 6% in September .
The monthly variation of the Consumer Price Index (IPC) was -0.2% – it was 1.1% in the ninth month and 1.2% in the same period last year – and the average variation over the past twelve months decreased from 6, 3% to 5.7%. %.
The Portuguese Harmonized Consumer Price Index (HICP), used for European comparisons, showed a year-on-year variation of 3.2%, a value 1.6 percentage points lower than that of the previous month and 0.3 percentage points higher than Eurostat’s estimated value for the euro area, INE indicates.
Excluding unprocessed food and energy products, the HICP reached a year-on-year variation of 4.8% in October, down from 5.5% in September, which is lower than the corresponding figure for the eurozone (estimated at 5%).
As for the monthly and average variations of this index over the past twelve months, they amounted to -0.4% (0.8% in the previous month and 1.1% in October 2022) and 6.6% (7, 2% in the previous month). .
Source: DN
