2024-11-07 20:22 update: 2024-11-09, 18:48
Photo PAP/Tomasz Waszczuk
Inflation in Poland will return to the target band of 2.5 percent plus/minus one percentage point in 2026, Adam Glapinski, governor of the National Bank of Poland, has said.
Glapinski held his monthly press conference on Thursday, a day after the central bank's Monetary Policy Council (RPP) decided to keep all rates on hold, with the country's reference rate still at 5.75 percent.
He said that his 2026 inflation projection held if the interest rates remained unchanged. "If the interest rates started to change, or decline, then of course this period would be extended."
Poland's inflation, which started to rise a gain a few months ago, hit 5 percent in October, the country's statistical office (GUS) said in a flash estimate last week.
But according to Glapinski, inflation should start declining in the second half of 2025, following a rise at the beginning of the year.
"The results of the November projection point to a further growth of inflation at the beginning of next year," he said. "When it comes to the level of inflation in the middle of next year, we don't know exactly what it will be, it depends on the government's decisions concerning energy (prices - PAP).
"But from the middle of 2025 inflation should... start to visibly decline and, according to data and current forecasts, where we assume keeping the current interest rates, will return to the target in 2026," Glapinski said.
According to him, core inflation, which excludes the most volatile prices of food and energy, may exceed 4 percent in the coming quarters.
RPP will be ready to cut rates when inflation stabilises and starts to decline, he concluded. (PAP)
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