ARGENTINA: Economists Expect Central Bank To Miss Inflation Target In 2018

(RTTNews) - Analysts slightly increased their inflation forecasts for 2017 in Argentina to 23.5% from 23% as regulated prices went higher - but kept unchanged at 21% the core inflation estimate for this year, according to a central bank survey.

For 2018, economists expect a 16.6% annual inflation rate, with core inflation at 14.9%. Both rates are above the 2018 inflation target, which ranges from 8% to 12%.

Respondents expect the Argentinean central bank to keep the benchmark interest rate unchanged at 28.75% until March 2018. From April forward, the rate should decrease gradually, reaching 22% per year at the end of 2018. Previously, analyst expected a steeper decline to 21%.

Regarding Argentina's Gross Domestic Product (GDP), expectations of annual growth remained stable at 2.9% for 2017 and 3.1% for 2018. Meanwhile, the expected GDP growth for 2019 was raised to 3.3% per year, from 3.2% in October's survey.