The National Administrative Department of Statistics, Dane, will reveal today the inflation data for April, for which financial analysts predict a new reduction.
According to Citibank’s expectations survey of 26 market analysts and economic research centers, April inflation is expected to decline from 7.36% to 7.15% on average.
The projections range from a minimum expectation of 7.01% and a maximum of 7.30%. No analyst predicts inflation below 7% in April.
Among the highest expectations are those of Grupo Bancolombia (7.30%); Bank of Bogotá (7.25%); BTG Pactual (7.24%) and Banco Santander, Bbva and Colfondos, tying with 7.20%. And the lowest projections are from Skandia and Axa Colpatria, with 7.01%, Banco Agrario (7.02%), Alianza (7.08%) and Anif (7.10%). Although the projections They are in the CPI completing 13 months in a row of falls, in April it would be the lowest reduction since this disinflation cycle began in March 2023.
If expectations of 7.15% inflation in April are met, The figure would be reduced by only 22 basis points, below the average drop of 49 basis points that it had been sustaining for a year.
According to a Bancolombia report, an acceleration in food prices would be the key to overall inflation.
“Although the performance of this segment has been one of the keys in the reduction of total inflation observed in the most recent 12 months, our high frequency estimates based on data from Sipsa and Servipunto suggests that monthly food inflation would accelerate for the sixth consecutive month, up to 1.45%. This would imply that, After 15 months of moderation, annual food inflation would increase (from 1.77% in March) to 3.32% in April. The most relevant thing would be the accumulated impact of an El Niño phenomenon – which has been in effect in the country for more than six months – on the perishable food segment.”says Bancolombia in its analysis and the entity with the highest projection.
Meanwhile, David Cubides, head of economic research at Alianza, one of the entities with the lowest projections, said that “we will continue to have a moderation in the year-on-year variation in consumer prices that we have been observing for more than a year. Within the key components, we see that at the top the housing and food component, which has been moderating, in the monthly variation it could be on the high side but in year-on-year terms it has been falling”.
