The consumer price index (CPI) rose 1.22 percent last month from a year earlier, but slowed from September’s year-on-year growth of 1.37 percent, as falling prices for consumer electronics mitigated increases in clothing and food costs, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
The easing inflationary pressure would give the central bank a free hand to keep the benchmark discount rate steady at 1.875 percent, helping to spur economic growth, analysts said.
The inflationary measure gained 1.22 percent last month as winter garments started to hit the shelves once temperatures began to fall, lifting the clothing price sub-index 6.23 percent, DGBAS section chief Wang Shu-chuan (王淑娟) told a media briefing.
Retailers tend to price clothing higher at the beginning of a new season and offer discounts once that season comes to an end.
Headline CPI edged up a mere 0.5 percent last month compared with September, and after seasonal adjustment, the increase dropped to 0.02 percent, the DGBAS report showed.
Food costs, which account for 24 percent of the index’s weight, saw a modest 1.02 percent increase year-on-year last month as egg prices picked up 25.43 percent, followed by dairy products at 5.99 percent, the report said.
However, a strong harvest pushed down vegetable prices 14.77 percent, keeping the food index relatively stable, the report said.
Transportation costs climbed 0.76 percent last month from a year earlier on rising oil prices, which more than offset telecommunication rate discounts, the report said.
OPEC crude oil cost US$106.29 a barrel last month, increasing 33.1 percent from the same period last year, the report showed.
Core CPI, used to track the long-term inflationary trend by excluding energy, vegetables and other volatile goods, accelerated to near a two-year high at 1.49 percent last month, reflecting mild, but steady increases in food costs, the report found.
The price increase would be most evident for people who often eat out as their food prices rose 2 percent last month, while prices for drinks picked up 2.8 percent, the report said.
The increases were likely contained because retailers offered temporary discounts to ease the pain of price adjustments last month, Wang said.
The wholesale price index, an indicator of production costs, rose 5.93 percent last month from a year earlier, accelerating for the third straight month, as raw material prices continued to rise, the report said.
Laura Chen (陳若昕), an economist at SinoPac Financial Holdings Co (永豐金控), expects the CPI to climb higher toward the end of this year as cold weather drives up demand for fuel.
The mild inflationary pressure would allow the central bank to focus on the economic front and stand by existing interest rates to stimulate growth, Chen said.
Tony Phoo (符銘財), a Taipei-based economist at Standard Chartered Bank, agreed, saying that the steadily rising core CPI would make more aggressive action unwarranted.
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure
RSS