By Joann Villanueva/PNA
MANILA — Report of further deceleration of the Philippine inflation rate last January is expected to help boost the local equities market.
On Tuesday, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported a 4.4 percent inflation rate in the first month this year, slower than the previous month’s 5.1 percent due to deceleration of the heavily weighted food and non-alcoholic beverages index to 5.6 percent from 6.7 percent in the previous month.
Food index, in particular, posted an inflation rate of 5.1 percent from month-ago’s 6.3 percent.
Lower inflation rates were also posted by alcoholic beverages and tobacco, clothing and footwear, housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels; health; and transport indices.
Relatively, the core inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy items, registered a rate of 4.4 percent from last December’s 4.7 percent.
Regina Capital managing director Luis Limlingan said the latest inflation report is lower than their 4.5 percent projection.
The lower-than-forecast figure “should bode well for the market,” he said.
“Buying momentum should continue as investors will be encouraged that this will soon fall closer to the admissible range of 2-4 percent,” he added.
