Inflation is no trigger for a rate cut

Inflation remains below the RBA's target range, but inflation outside the range is common and the RBA will be reluctant to cut rates.

Inflation is still below the RBA's target range, but there are good reasons that won't prompt another interest rate cut.

The RBA has had a target for inflation - the annual growth rate of the consumer price index - of two to three per cent since 1993.

And inflation in the year to the end of June came in at just 1.5 per cent, below the target band for the third quarter in a row.

But the RBA won't be making a knee-jerk rate cut to boost economic growth and allow wage and price rises to accelerate.

For one thing, interest rates are already as low as they have been for over half a century.

Whatever the economy might be lacking, it's not cheap money.

And as RBA governor Glenn Stevens went out of his way to stress in his annual Anika Foundation speech on Wednesday, there are dangers involved in overusing a cheap money policy.

It works mainly by encouraging people to take more risks than they otherwise might.

Sometimes too many risks.

The booming Sydney and Melbourne housing markets are no doubt a major consideration for the RBA's board right now, and a strong argument against more rate cuts.

Although the latest inflation rate is below the target band, an out-of-range inflation rate is hardly unusual.

In fact, it's quite normal.

Since the RBA first mooted its target in March 1993, the annual inflation rate has been outside of the target range, either above or below it, 57 per cent of the time.

That's even though the average inflation rate over that time has been exactly 2.5 per cent - right in the middle of the range - after allowing for the one-off price jump from the GST in 2000.

What's more important is how the inflation rate is expected to behave over the coming few years, when the effect of any interest rate change would be percolating through the economy.

And the latest figures just confirm the RBA's previously published view that inflation will probably edge up over the coming year to around the middle of the band, and stay there for the year or two after that.

The best that can be said for the latest inflation numbers is that they certainly won't stand in the way of a rate cut if the RBA thinks the risk is worth taking.

But they won't be triggering an automatic response.

More likely the RBA will be hoping that the Australian dollar's recent depreciation - and, hopefully, more to come - will do the heavy lifting.


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3 min read

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Source: AAP


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