Italian consumer price inflation accelerates slightly year-on-year in December

The Italian consumer price index rose 0.2 percent sequentially in December and was up 0.5 percent year-on-year, according to preliminary estimates. In the whole of 2019, the average annual rate of change of consumer prices came in at 0.6 percent, a slowdown from 1.2 percent in 2018. Core inflation, which excludes energy and unprocessed food, slowed to 0.5 percent from 0.7 percent.

The acceleration of the growth on annual basis of all items index was mainly due to prices of non-regulated energy products. The core inflation and inflation excluding energy came in at 0.7 percent and 0.8 percent, respectively.

On a sequential basis, the rise was driven by increases of prices of services related to transport, which rose 0.9 percent, of unprocessed food that rose 0.6 percent. The rise was also driven by non-regulated energy products and services related to recreation.

The annual rate of change of prices of goods was zero and that one of prices of services was 1 percent. The inflationary gap between services and goods was lower with respect to November but still positive and equal to 1 percentage point.

Prices of grocery and unprocessed food rose 0.2 percent on monthly basis and 0.8 percent on annual basis.

According to preliminary estimates, the Italian harmonized index of consumer prices rose 0.2 percent compared with the previous month and by 0.5 percent year-on-year. In the whole of 2019, the average annual rate of change of HICP was 0.6 percent.