A Turkish national flag (left) and a flag with the portrait of Kemal Ataturk, the founder of the modern Turkish republic, hang on the outside of a building in the Sisli district of Istanbul, Turkey, on Monday, August 29, 2022.
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Inflation in Turkey accelerated to an annual rate of 69.8% in April, the Turkish statistics office reported on Friday.
The highest year-on-year consumer price increases were in education, with an increase of 103.86%, and hotels, cafes and restaurants, with an increase of 95.82%.
On a monthly basis, inflation in Turkey rose 3.18%, led by price increases for alcoholic beverages and tobacco, as well as for hotels, cafes and restaurants.
April’s inflation rate marks the highest annual increase since November 2022, when inflation was around 85%.
While a stunning number, April’s CPI reading of nearly 70% was actually a smaller increase than many analysts expected. But any hopes of interest rate cuts are a long way off, economists said.
The Turkish central bank has raised its key interest rate to 50%, citing the ongoing need to counter rising inflation in the country. The bank said in March that “the restrictive monetary policy will be maintained until a significant and sustained decline in the underlying trend of monthly inflation is observed.”
“The slightly smaller-than-expected rise in Turkish inflation in April to 69.8% year-on-year (consensus 70.3%) offers encouraging signs that price pressures have eased again,” said Liam Peach, senior emerging markets economist at Capital Economics in London. wrote in a note on Friday.
“We expect inflation to fall in the second half of this year, but we are not quite as optimistic about the pace of inflation reduction. … Given this, we still do not expect the central bank to move to cutting interest rates until next year.”
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2024-05-03 14:53:40
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