Accelerating weekly inflation in Russia part of forecast, all going according to Economic Development Ministry's outlook of 7.5% for 2023 - Reshetnikov

MOSCOW. Sept 28 (Interfax) - Russia's weekly inflation accelerating to nearly 0.3% is still in line with the Economic Development Ministry's forecast for inflation in 2023, and the ministry has included these fluctuations in the schedule, Economic Development Minister Maxim Reshetnikov told reporters.

"No, we are within the range, within the schedule, which is 7.5% at the end of the year," Reshetnikov answered when asked whether weekly inflation accelerating to nearly 0.3% was out of line with the forecast of 7.5% for the year.

"One must also look at last year's base for comparison. We accounted for these fluctuations when we set our estimates. We are going according to plan for now, everything is going according to plan," Reshetnikov added.

According to Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat) data, inflation accelerated sharply to 0.28% from September 19 to 25 after 0.13% from September 12 to 18.

Weekly inflation of nearly 0.3% was the highest figure since the first week of December 2022, when weekly inflation was 0.58% owing to the indexation of tariffs for housing and communal services by 9% beginning on December 1.

Inflation was 0.60% for September 1-25, and 4.32% since the beginning of the year as on September 25.

According data for the first 25 days of September this year and last year, Russia's annual inflation as on September 25 had accelerated to 5.84% from 5.64% as on September 18 and 5.15% as at the end of August when calculated from weekly trends, which is the Central Bank's methodology judging by the estimates for annual inflation in statements from CBR board meetings; and had accelerated to 5.73% from 5.45% as on September 18 when calculated from the average daily data for all of September 2022, with the Economic Development Ministry having switched to this calculation method in February.

The Central Bank of Russia (CBR) on September 15 raised its inflation outlook to 6%-7% for 2023 from the previous forecast of 5%-6.5%, while maintaining outlook of 4% for 2024.

The Economic Development Ministry in September hiked its inflation forecast substantially to 7.5% for 2023 from its outlook of 5.3% in April, outstripping even the CBR's latest forecast, and the ministry raised its outlook to 4.5% for 2024 from its previous forecast of 4%.