[PORTFOLIO] 12 August 2020 – LONDON (Alliance News) — Italy suffered slightly more severe consumer price deflation in July than previously estimated, Italian statistics office Istat said in a report published on Wednesday.
Italy recorded its third month in a row of annual deflation in July as the consumer price index decreased by 0.4% year-over-year, following falls of 0.3% in June and 0.2% in May.
The final figure for July was revised by Istat from its flash estimate – reported at the end of the month – of a 0.3% decrease.Expectations according to FXStreet also were for a less marked annual decrease of 0.3% in July.
Prices continued to fall on an annual basis for transport, by 3.3%, housing and utilities, by 4.0%, communication, by 4.4%, and restaurants and hotels, by 0.2%.
Meanwhile, price increases for food & non-alcoholic beverages eased to 1.4% from the increase of 2.4% in the prior month. The annual core inflation rate – which excludes energy and unprocessed food – slowed to 0.6% from 0.9% in June.
On a monthly basis, consumer prices declined by 0.2% after a 0.1% loss in the prior month. In this case, the figure was revised by Istat from its previous flash estimate recording a 0.1% decrease in July.
Italy’s harmonised consumer price index, used for EU-wide comparison, grew by 0.8% in July on a year before, revised from a rise of 0.9% and compared to a fall of 0.4% in June, while, with respect to the previous month, there was a decrease of 0.7% in July, versus the flash estimate of 0.6%.
By Andrea Battaglia; Copyright 2020 Alliance News Limited. All Right Reserved.
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SOURCE: Alliance News, https://bit.ly/3ixVSnv