2023.06.0909:36:00UTC+00Norway Inflation Rises 4-month High; PPI Falls

Norway's consumer price inflation rose slightly to the four-month high in May and producer prices declined sharply on falling energy and food industry prices, data from Statistics Norway revealed Friday.

The consumer price index, or CPI, increased 6.7 percent on a yearly basis in May after rising 6.4 percent in April. However, the rate was well above economists' forecast of 6.2 percent.

The latest reading reached its highest level since January, when it was 7.0 percent.

Meanwhile, core inflation, which is adjusted for tax changes and excludes energy products, rose unexpectedly for a third month, to 6.7 percent from 6.3 percent. Economists had forecast the core rate to fall to 6.2 percent.

On a monthly basis, overall consumer price growth accelerated to 0.5 percent from 1.1 percent, while economists expected the monthly inflation to slow to 0.3 percent.

Food and non-alcoholic beverages prices, and clothing and footwear segments provided stronger contribution to the overall inflation.

Separate data from Statistics Norway showed that producer prices declined for the fifth month in a row in May.

Total producer prices sank 23.5 percent from a year ago in May, which was a bigger fall than the 15.3 percent decline in April.

Energy goods prices logged an annual fall of 37.8 percent and cost of extraction and related services declined 39.4 percent. The costs of electricity, gas and steam dropped 9.2 percent.

Month-on-month, producer prices posted a monthly decline of 8.3 percent, in contrast to the 0.8 percent growth in April. The monthly decline was led by falling food and energy prices.

Excluding energy, producer prices rose 7.0 percent from a year ago.