China’s consumer prices see May uptick as oil shock inflates factory-gate costs
The mild increase in consumer inflation, attributed to higher AI demand and global price fluctuations, fell short of market expectations
China’s consumer inflation edged up in May from a year earlier, as the global oil shock linked to the US-Israel war on Iran helped alleviate some of the price effects from persistent weaknesses in household spending.
The consumer price index (CPI), a key gauge of inflation, rose by 1.2 per cent year on year in May, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released on Wednesday.
The reading fell short of the 1.4 per cent increase estimated by economists in a survey by financial data provider Wind, and was unchanged from the 1.2 per cent increase observed in April. On a month-on-month basis, the CPI dropped by 0.1 per cent.
Meanwhile, the producer price index (PPI) – which tracks the cost of goods at the factory gate – rose by 3.9 per cent year on year.
This beat the Wind estimate of a 3.5 per cent rise, and eclipsed the 2.8 per cent increase recorded in April.