Consumer prices

In July 2021 the rate of change of Italian consumer price index for the whole nation (NIC) was +0.5% on monthly basis and +1.9% on annual basis (+1.3% in June); the flash estimate was +1.8%.

The speed-up of the growth on annual basis of All-item index was mainly due to the prices of Regulated energy products (that were up from +16.9% to +34.2%), whereas the Non-regulated ones slowed down (from +12.8% to +11.2%). Moreover, prices of Processed food including alcohol reversed the trend (from -0.4% to +0.2%), those of Unprocessed food reduced the decrease (from -1.1% to -0.2%), those of Services related to recreation, including repair and personal care sped-up (from +1.0% to +1.3%) and there was a lower decline also of prices and of Services related to transport (from -1.4% to -0.2%).

Core inflation (excluding energy and unprocessed food) was +0.6% and inflation excluding energy was +0.4% (both up from +0.3% in the previous month).

The increase on monthly basis was mainly due to the prices of Regulated energy products (+11.3%) and, to a lesser extent, to those of Services related to transport (+1.1%) and of Services related to recreation, including repair and personal care (+0.8%); instead, prices of Unprocessed food decreased (-1.6%).

The rate of change of Prices of Grocery and unprocessed food was -0.5% on monthly basis and zero variation on annual basis (from -0.7% in the previous month).

In July 2021 the rate of change of the Italian harmonized index of consumer prices (HICP) was -1.0% on monthly basis and +1.0% on annual basis (from +1.3% in June); the flash estimate was +0.9%. The slowdown of HICP (unlike NIC) was due to the summer sales (not considered by NIC), which caused a decrease on monthly basis of prices of Clothing and footwear (-18.2%) much greater than that of July 2020  (-6.4%) for the delayed start of summer sales in 2020 (August, 1) in almost all the Italian regions. This difference reflects on the rate of change on annual basis of prices of Clothing and footwear (from +0.6% in June to -12.1%) and on that of the all item index.

On pages 12-13 the methodological note describes the choices adopted to deal with the ongoing issues deriving from Covid-19 crisis.