BANGKOK – Thailand’s annual headline inflation rate in December likely quickened from the previous month but remained below the central bank’s target for the seventh straight month, a Reuters poll showed on Friday.
The headline consumer price index (CPI) is forecast to rise 0.9% in December from a year earlier after November’s 0.21% increase, according to the median forecast of nine economists in the poll.
The Bank of Thailand (BOT) forecast headline inflation of 0.7% for this year and 0.8% for 2020.
That will still be lower than the central bank’s official target range of 1%-4% for 2019 and 1%-3% for 2020. The target is reviewed each year.
The core inflation rate, which strips out energy and fresh food prices, was seen at 0.5% in December, according to the poll. It was 0.47% in November.
On Dec. 18, the BOT left its benchmark interest rate THCBIR=ECI unchanged at a record low of 1.25% after two cuts earlier in 2019 to support flagging economic growth.
