2021.04.2106:23:00UTC+00UK Inflation Accelerates In March

UK consumer price inflation accelerated in March, data from the Office for National Statistics showed on Wednesday.

Consumer prices advanced 0.7 percent year-on-year, faster than the 0.4 percent increase seen in February. But inflation was slightly below economists' forecast of 0.8 percent.

On a monthly basis, inflation rose to 0.3 percent, as expected, from 0.1 percent a month ago.

Core inflation that excludes prices of energy, food, alcoholic beverages and tobacco, climbed to 1.1 percent from 0.9 percent. The annual rate matched economists' expectations.

Another report from the ONS showed that output price inflation came in at 1.9 percent in March, up from 0.9 percent in February. This was the third consecutive month the rate has been positive and the highest the annual rate of output inflation has been since April 2019.

Meanwhile, monthly growth in output prices eased to 0.5 percent from 0.7 percent in the prior month.

Input price inflation accelerated to 5.9 percent from 3.3 percent in February. On month, input prices gained 1.3 percent versus 0.9 percent in the previous month.