Consumer prices: provisional data

In February 2014, according to provisional estimates, the Italian consumer price index for the whole nation (NIC) decreased by 0.1% compared with the previous month and rose by 0.5% with respect to February 2013 (0.2 lower than in January 2014).

The slowdown of inflation was mainly due to volatile components, such as unprocessed food and energy. Excluding these components, core inflation was stable at 1.0%. Excluding only energy, the inflation was 0.9%, down from 1.0% in January 2014.

The decrease on monthly basis of All items index was mainly due to the decline of prices of Fresh vegetables and Fresh fruit (respectively -4.6% and -1.0% compared with January 2014) ‒ on which seasonal factors had an impact ‒ and to monthly decrease of prices of Non-regulated energy products (-0.9%); the monthly decrease of prices of Services related to communication (-0.7%) had a downward impact, too.

The annual rate of change of prices of Goods fell to -0.1% (from +0.3% in January 2014), while the annual rate of change of prices of Services rose to 1.2% (+1.1% in the previous month). As a consequence, the inflationary gap between Services and Goods increased by 0.5 percentage points with respect to January 2014.

Prices of Grocery and unprocessed food decreased by 0.3% on monthly basis and rose by 0.9% on annual basis (down from +1.3% in January 2014).

In February 2014, according to preliminary estimates, the Italian harmonized index of consumer prices (HICP) decreased by 0.3% compared with the previous month and rose by 0.5% with respect to February 2013 (0.1 lower than in January 2014). The decrease on monthly basis was also due to the winter sales of Clothing and footwear (-2.2% compared with January 2014), which are not taken into account in the national index NIC.

Core inflation measured by Italian HICP was 1.1%, up from 1.0% in January 2014. Italian HICP, excluding energy, increased by 1.0% with respect to February 2013 (0.1 lower than in January 2014).