Singapore’s Inflation in the previous month was lower than expected because of the slow rate of price increase across different sectors of consumer spending. The consumer price index which measures mainly the inflation increased by 0.1 percent in April than the similar month last year, according to Department of Statistics released data on Wednesday. The figure was lesser than the previous increase of 0.2 percent in March and also below economists’ forecast of 0.4 percent. Weaker inflation reading was due to smaller increases in retail items including electricity & gas and services and a deeper cut in the cost of private road transport as reported by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) on Wednesday. The core inflation, excluding the accommodation and private road transport costs to gauge more effectively expenses for everyday, dropped to 1.3 percent in April from 1.5 percent in March. This means lower retail inflation and minute increase in electricity tariffs. The overall cost of retail items climbed to 0.9 percent in April, lesser than the 1.3 percent rise in March, which was influenced by a steeper decline of prices in personal care products. Prices in recreation and entertainment goods also declined. Electricity and gas expenses increased at a more moderate pace of 3.7 percent in April compared to the 6.2 percent last month, indicating smaller augmentation in electricity tariffs. Meanwhile, private road transport expenses declined by 0.8 percent in April, which is bigger than the 0.6 percent drop in March. Reduction in car prices last year after a drop in Certificate of Entitlement (COE) premiums have counterbalanced steeper price increase of petrol.
