Headline inflation decreased significantly from 3.9 percent in August to 1.5 percent in September 2024, breaching the lower bound of the medium-term objective range of 3 – 6 percent, and was notably lower than the 3.2 percent recorded in September 2023. The decrease in inflation between August and September 2024 was mainly due to the base effects associated with the increase in domestic fuel prices on 13 September 2023, which added 1.31 percentage points to headline inflation. Furthermore, inflation fell due to the reduction in domestic fuel prices effected on 11 September 2024, which subtracted 0.8 percentage points from headline inflation, as well as the deceleration in the rate of annual price change for most categories of goods and services. Inflation for domestic tradeables increased from 4.1 percent to 4.3 percent between August and September 2024, due to the broad-based increase in food prices. However, inflation for imported tradeables decreased sharply from 5.2 percent to -0.2 percent during the same period, mainly on account of base effects associated with the upward adjustment of domestic fuel prices in September 2023 and the downward adjustment in domestic fuel prices in September 2024. As a result, all tradeables inflation decreased from 4.9 percent to 0.9 percent between August and September 2024. Inflation for non-tradeables declined slightly from 2.5 percent to 2.4 percent in the same period.
Similarly, the 16 percent trimmed mean inflation and inflation excluding administered prices decreased from 3.7 percent and 3.2 percent to 1.5 percent and 3.1 percent, respectively, between August and September 2024.