{"id":21405,"date":"2023-04-24T13:46:02","date_gmt":"2023-04-24T13:46:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/mexico-inflation-cools-in\/"},"modified":"2023-04-24T13:49:25","modified_gmt":"2023-04-24T13:49:25","slug":"mexico-inflation-cools-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/mexico-inflation-cools-to\/","title":{"rendered":"Mexico inflation cools to lowest since Oct 2021, fueling rate cut hopes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -Mexican inflation slowed in the first half of April and reached its lowest level in a year and a half, the national statistics agency said on Monday, fueling expectations the central bank may have completed a long cycle of interest rate hikes.<\/p>\n<p>Annual headline inflation through mid-April hit 6.24%, further declining from the 17-month low of 6.85% hit across March and the lowest since the first half of October 2021, when the rate was 6.12%.<\/p>\n<p>Though still above the central bank&#8217;s target of 3%, plus or minus a percentage point, Monday&#8217;s figures may lead the monetary authority to pause a tightening cycle that took interest rates up by 725 basis points since June 2021.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Inflation is falling rapidly,&#8221; said Pantheon Macroeconomics&#8217; chief Latin America economist Andres Abadia, noting that indicators signal a clear downtrend over the next three-to-six months. &#8220;Banxico likely will hold rates in May.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Banxico, as Mexico&#8217;s central bank is known, will make its next monetary policy announcement on May 18.<\/p>\n<p>The bank&#8217;s board voted to raise the benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points to 11.25% in late March, with board members striking a more dovish tone on the future of rate moves. <\/p>\n<p>Mexico&#8217;s core inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy products and has been previously cited by the central bank as persistent at high levels, stood at 7.75% in the year through early April, down from 8.15% a month earlier.<\/p>\n<p>A Reuters poll of analysts had projected headline inflation at 6.28% in the month&#8217;s first half, and core inflation at 7.78%.<\/p>\n<p>The fresh figures &#8220;mean that another 25bp interest rate hike at the next Banxico meeting no longer looks nailed on,&#8221; Capital Economics&#8217; deputy chief emerging markets economists Jason Tuvey said in a note to clients.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;(But) we still think this final increase in the policy rate is more likely than not.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p> (Reporting by Natalia Siniawski and Brendan O&#8217;Boyle; additional reporting by Gabriel Araujo; editing by Barbara Lewis and Jonathan Oatis)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/mexico-inflation-cools-in\/mexicos-central-bank-presents-coin-commemorating-the-100th-anniversary-of\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportEconomy\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3N0DG-VIEWIMAGE.jpg\" alt=\"tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3N0DG-VIEWIMAGE\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -Mexican inflation slowed in the first half of April and reached its lowest level in a year and a half, the national statistics agency said on Monday, fueling expectations the central bank may have completed a long cycle of interest rate hikes. Annual headline inflation through mid-April hit 6.24%, further declining from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":21406,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1216],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-21405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-economy","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportEconomy\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3N0DG-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21405"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21405\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21448,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21405\/revisions\/21448"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}