Consumer prices rose 0.4% in November, up 2.6% on year

Portugal’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 0.4% in November and was up 2.6% from the same month of 2020, or 0.8 of a percentage point more than the year-on-year increase in October, Statistics Portugal (INE) confirmed on Tuesday.

Rounded to one decimal place, the year-on-year increase coincides with the value of the flash estimate for November inflation released by the INE on November 30.

The underlying inflation index (the total index excluding unprocessed food and energy products) also points to an acceleration in annual inflation, up 0.6% on the month and 1.7% on the year.

The aggregate relating to energy products was up 14.1% on the year earlier (up from a 13.4% year-on-year rate in the previous month), while the index relating to unprocessed food products was up 0.8%, after in October it was down 0.7% on the year.

By types of expenditure, the year-on-year growth rates of ‘leisure, recreation and culture’ and ‘restaurants and hotels’ were 3.1% and 2.8%, respectively (having been 1.0% and 0.9% in October), while prices in ‘communications’ and ‘health’ were up 0.5% and 1.1% on the year, respectively (having been up 1.4% and 1.8% in October). Clothing and footwear was the only segment to register a negative contribution.

The November month-on-month increase of 0.4% followed an October increase of 0.5%, while in November 2020 the index fell 0.3%. The average monthly variation of the last 12 months was 1.0% (0.8% in October).

The Portuguese Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) rose 0.3% in November (after a rise of 0.4% in October) and was up 2.6% on the year, a rate 0.8 of a point higher than that for October and 2.3 points below the value estimated by Eurostat for the eurozone – the same difference as in October. The average month-on-month change over the last 12 months was 0.7% (having been 0.4% in October).