Consumer prices (provisional data)

In September 2015, according to preliminary estimates, the Italian consumer price index for the whole nation (NIC) declined by 0.3% compared with the previous month and rose by 0.3 with respect to September 2014, up from 0.2 in August 2015.

The slight speed up of the inflation was mainly due to the further increase of prices of Unprocessed food (+3.4%, from +1,9% in August 2015) and of the reversal trend of prices of Services related to transport (+0.8%, from -0.1% in the previous month). These increases are partially offset by the further decrease of Non-regulated energy products (-12.8%, from -10.4% in August 2015).

Excluding energy and unprocessed food, core inflation was 0.8% (up from +0.7% registered in August 2015); excluding energy, the inflation rose by 0.9 (0.1 higher than in the previous month).

The decrease on monthly basis of All items index was mainly due to the decline – on which seasonal factors had an impact – of prices of Services related to transport (-4.0%); this decline was partially balanced by the monthly increases of prices of Unprocessed food (+1.8%).

The annual rate of change of prices of Goods was -0.5% (from -0.4% observed in August 2015) and the annual rate of prices of Services was +0.9% (up from +0.7% in the previous month). As consequence, the inflationary gap between Services and Goods increased by 0.3 percentage points with respect to August 2015.

Prices of Grocery and unprocessed food increased by 0.6% on monthly basis and by 1.3% on annual basis (up from 0.7% in the previous month) .

In September 2015, according to preliminary estimates, the Italian harmonized index of consumer prices (HICP) rose by 1.6 compared with the previous month and by 0.2% with respect to September 2014 (down from +0.4% registered in August 2015).

Core inflation measured by Italian HICP was 0.8%, down from 1.0% in August 2015; excluding energy, food, alcohol and tobacco, the inflation was 0.7% (0.3 lower than in August 2015). Excluding energy, the inflation decreased to 1.0%, down from 1.1% registered in the previous month.