Consumer prices - April 2023

In April 2023 the rate of change of the Italian consumer price index for the whole nation (NIC) was +0.4% on monthly basis and +8.2% on annual basis (from +7.6% in March); the flash estimate was +8.3%.

The speed-up of the growth on annual basis of All-item index was mainly due to the prices of Non-regulated energy products (from +18.9% to +26.6%) and, to a lesser extent, it is also due to prices of Services related to recreation, including repair and personal care (from +6.3% to +6.9%) and of Services – miscellaneous (from +2.5% to +2.9%). Quite the opposite, the annual rate of change of the prices of Regulated energy products showed a wider decrease than in March (from -20.3% to -26.7%) and the prices of Processed food including alcohol (from +15.3% to +14.0%), of Unprocessed food (form +9.1% to +8.4%), of Services related to housing (from +3.5% to +3.2%) and of Services related to transport (from +6.3% to +6.0%) slowed down.

The core inflation (All-items excluding energy and unprocessed food) was +6.2% (from +6.3% in March) and the All-items index excluding energy was +6.3% (from +6.4% in previous month.

The annual rate of change of prices of Goods was +10.4% (up from +9.7% in March) and that of prices of Services was +4.8% (from +4.5% in the previous month). As a consequence, the negative inflationary gap between Services and Goods increases in absolute value (from -5.2 percentage points in March to -5.6).

Prices of Grocery and unprocessed food increased by +0.4% on monthly basis and by +11.6% on annual basis (down from +12.6% in the previous month).

The month on month increase of NIC was mainly due to the prices of Services related to transport (+2.4%), Non-regulated energy products (+2.3%), Services related to recreation, including repair and personal care (+1.0%), Processed food including alcohol, Non-durable goods and Services – miscellaneous (all three at +0.5%); At the same time, the prices of Regulated energy products have decreased (-19.6%).

In April 2023, the Italian harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP) was +0.9% on monthly basis and +8.7% on annual basis (from +8.1% in March); the flash estimate was +8.8%. The different monthly dynamics between HICP and NIC was due to the end of the winter sales (not considered in the NIC index), that partly continued in March (in April, the prices of Clothing and footwear was +4.8% on monthly basis).

Note. On 16 June 2023 the text of the press release and the related tables have been replaced due to the revision of some products in the field of regulated energy sources;
The data affected by the change is indicated with the flag (r).