Consumer prices - May 2023

In May 2023 the rate of change of the Italian consumer price index for the whole nation (NIC) was +0.3% on monthly basis and +7.6% on annual basis (from +8.2% in April); the flash estimate was +7.6%.

The slowdown of the annual inflation rate was mainly due to the prices of non-regulated energy products (from +26.6% to +20.3%) and, to a lesser extent, of processed food including alcohol (from +14.0% to +13.2%), of non energy industrial goods (from +5.3% to +5.0%), of services related to transport (from +6.0% to +5.6%) and of services related to recreation, including repair and personal care (from +6.9% to +6.7%). At the opposite, an upward contribution to the inflation rate came from the prices of unprocessed food (form +8.4% to +8.8%) and of services related to housing (from +3.2% to +3.5%).

The core inflation (all-items excluding energy and unprocessed food) was +6.0% (down from +6.2% in April) and the all-items index excluding energy was +6.2% (from +6.3% in previous month).

As for goods, the year on year grotwth rate was +9.3% (down from +10.3% in April) while for services the annual rate of change was +4.6% (from +4.8% in the previous month). As a consequence, the negative inflationary gap between services and goods decreases in absolute value (from -5.5 percentage points in April to -4.7).

Prices of grocery and unprocessed food increased by +0.8% on monthly basis and by +11.2% on annual basis (down from +11.6% in the previous month).

The month on month increase of NIC was mainly due to the prices of unprocessed food (+1.5%), of services related to recreation, including repair and personal care (+1.0%), of processed food including alcohol (+0.6%) and of services related to housing (+0.4%). At the same time, the prices of Non-regulated energy products (-1.6%) and Regulated energy products (-0.2%) showed a decrease.

In May 2023, the Italian harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP) increased by 0.3% on monthly basis and by 8.0% on annual basis (from +8.6% in the previous month); the flash estimate was +8.1%.

Note. On 16 June 2023 at 10,00 a.m, the text of the press release Consumer Prices – April 2023 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).