ANKARA (dpa-AFX) - Turkey's consumer price inflation weakened to the lowest level since mid-2018 in August, leaving the door open for more monetary policy easing.
Consumer prices advanced 15.01 percent year-on-year in August following a 16.65 percent rise in July, figures from the Turkish Statistical Institute showed Tuesday. This was the lowest since May 2018, when the rate was 12.15 percent.
On a monthly basis, consumer prices gained 0.86 percent versus 1.36 percent in July.
Economists had forecast annual rate to slow to 15.6 percent and the monthly rate to fall to 1.3 percent.
Food and non-alcoholic beverages prices advanced 17.2 percent and alcoholic beverages and tobacco prices surged 41.4 percent annually.
The steeper-than-expected fall in inflation in August leaves the door wide open for the central bank to cut interest rates aggressively again when the Monetary Policy Committee, meets next week, Jason Tuvey, an economist at Capital Economics, said.
The economist expects a 250 basis-point reduction in the one-week repo rate to 17.25 percent. Further ahead, though, inflation is likely to rise again and the lira is likely to come under pressure, forcing the MPC to reverse course, Tuvey added.
In July, the bank had reduced the one-week repo auction rate sharply by 425 basis points to 19.75 percent.
Another report from the statistical office showed that producer price inflation slowed notably to 13.45 percent in August from 21.66 percent in July. The rate reached its lowest since January 2018.
Month-on-month, producer prices slid 0.59 percent after easing 0.99 percent in July.
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