CPI inflation will peak at 19-20% y/y in February 2023 and the disinflation process will start from March, according to Deputy Finance Minister Piotr Patkowski.
“It seems that February will be above 19%. Whether it will be 20% – at this point it is difficult to say. It will be a range between 19% and 20%, maybe a little over 20%. On the other hand, at this point, according to the predictions of the Ministry of Finance, it will be this range of 19-20%,” Patkowski said in an interview with Radio Plus.
He recalled that the National Bank of Poland (NBP) in its predictions assumes that we may see a single-digit level of inflation in late 2023.
“Whether this will be the case – time will tell. For the moment, what we can be reasonably sure of – provided that some unforeseen geopolitical situation doesn’t happen again – is that from March there will be a period of strong disinflation. And then these projections of falling inflation will take on real force and real reality,” the deputy minister added.
According to the Central Statistical Office (GUS), consumer inflation was 17.5% on an annual basis in November 2022. Compared to the previous month, prices of goods and services rose by 0.7%.
According to the NBP, consumer inflation will be – according to the central path of the November inflation projection – 14.5% in 2022, 13.1% in 2023, 5.9% in 2024 and 3.5% in 2025. CPI inflation will only return to the range of deviations from the NBP’s inflation target defined as 2.5% +/- 1 percentage point at the end of the projection horizon (covering 2022-2025).
In 2023, according to the central path of the inflation projection, consumer inflation will be – according to the central path of the inflation projection – 19.6% y/y in Q1, 14.2% in Q2, 11.1% in Q3 and 8% in Q4.
Source: GUS, NBP, Ministry of Finance and ISBnews
