According to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, he was satisfied to notice inflation recede in his country on Saturday but warned that expense-of-living pressures stayed.
Data released this week revealed that Australian inflation was restricted to an eight-month low in February, partly due to declining holiday travel and housing costs, fueling the case that the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) will halt its rate hike cycle at a meeting on Tuesday. Reuters.
Albanese told reporters in Melbourne that the results were satisfactory, and the trend was heading in the correct direction this week with the numbers, but it is understood that there is the price of living pressures.
He added that inflation stayed a “real issue” and a “global phenomenon,” campaigning with the Labor Party candidate for the federal seat of Aston in Victoria, where a by-election was being held.
Persistent inflation has been a challenge for the RBA, which, last month, raised its rate to the highest level in over a decade.
Due to inflation, the expenditure on living has evolved into a fundamental political problem and was the principle of last weekend’s election in New South Wales, the country’s most populous state.
The most delinquent data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, published on Wednesday, directed the monthly consumer price index (CPI) to rise 6.8 percent in the year to February, the most lagging rise since June.
And the Reserve Bank of Australia raised interest rates
Australia’s central bank raised interest rates by a quarter percentage point. It said further tightening of monetary policy would be needed to quell stubbornly high inflation, pushing up currency and bond yields.
At its first meeting of the year, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) increased rates to 3.35 percent, the most elevated level after September 2012, in an anticipated decision. In his statement outlining expectations for further hikes, Governor Philip Lowe rejected last year’s comment that the bank was not on a predetermined path on interest rates.
