The Hungarian forint fell and the 3-year bond yield dropped to a record low on disappointing GDP figures released yesterday. The dismal fourth quarter supports our opinion that further monetary easing is in the pipeline. We stick to our prediction of additional cuts totalling 100 bps in the course of the following 6 months.
In the Czech Republic, the CNB has published minutes from the last meeting of its Board. Most Board members were obviously satisfied with current exchange rate levels of the Czech currency. The consensus was that risks to the new forecast were broadly balanced and eased in both directions. The decision to leave the interest rates as well as other policy tools unchanged was unanimous.
Today, we are curious about Polish inflation figures. Poland’s inflation likely continued to decelerate in January - prices were up by 2.2% y/y and 0.5% m/m according to our forecast. The month-on-month price increase was likely due primarily to food and soft drinks, the price of which might go up by 1.1%. By contrast, we anticipate a stagnating transport sub-index; petrol and diesel prices at filling stations have not yet fully absorbed a fairly rapid increase of fuel prices in Rotterdam in the second half of January. Year-on-year inflation is set to decelerate in the course of next months and conceivably even fall below 2% in March.