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Egypt’s inflation rate rises to near four-year high

The inflation rate sped up from August’s 14.6% year-on-year, according to CAPMAS data, to the highest level since November 2018, when it hit 15.7%

Published: Mon 10 Oct 2022, 5:45 PM

Updated: Mon 10 Oct 2022, 5:46 PM

  • By
  • Reuters

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A luffa vendor looks for customers in the Old Cairo district of Cairo, Egypt. — AP

A luffa vendor looks for customers in the Old Cairo district of Cairo, Egypt. — AP

Egypt’s annual urban consumer inflation rose to a slightly faster-than-expected 15 per cent in September, its highest in almost four years, data from the country’s statistics agency CAPMAS showed on Monday.

The inflation rate sped up from August’s 14.6 per cent year-on-year, according to CAPMAS data, to the highest level since November 2018, when it hit 15.7 per cent.

A Reuters poll of nine economists had expected inflation to come in at 14.7 per cent. They also anticipated that core inflation, due out later on Monday, would climb to 17 per cent.

The pick-up in inflation was caused by a higher-than-forecast month-on-month increase in prices, which rose by 1.6 per cent in September, pushed up mainly by food and tobacco prices, Naeem Brokerage said in a note.

Egypt’s central bank, whose Monetary Policy Committee meets next on November 3, targets a rate between five per cent and nine per cent, but in June said it expected inflation to exceed the target in the fourth quarter before subsequently declining. — Reuters



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