Slovenia's annual inflation steady in November at 1.4%

Ljubljana, 29 November (STA) - Consumer prices in Slovenia grew at an annual rate of 1.4% in November, which is level with the month before. On the monthly level, prices grew by 0.1%. The annual inflation is driven by higher prices of services and goods, which contributed 1.1 and 0.3 percentage points, respectively, the Statistics Office said on Friday.

Annual inflation was pushed up the most (by 0.4 of a percentage point) by higher prices of food, with prices of fruit rising by 10.2% and prices of meat by 4.5%, and by higher prices in the group miscellaneous goods and services, where the most notably price hike was recorded in the category private insurance connected with health (14%).

Higher prices of water supply and services related to housing, which grew by 7.4%, contributed some 0.3 percentage points and costlier services in the hospitality sector (+3.8%) added another 0.2 points.

On the other hand, slowing down the inflation by 0.3 points were lower prices of petroleum products. In this group, liquid fuel prices decreased by 5.5% and the prices of fuels and lubricants by 5.3%.

At the monthly level, there were no significant price increases causing the 0.1% price increase, according to the Statistics Office. The monthly growth rate was pushed up 0.1 p.p. each by higher prices of insurance services (+2.2%) and fruit (+3.6%).

Various other price increases contributed 0.2 percentage points.

Meanwhile, pushing the monthly inflation down by 0.1 p.p. each were lower prices of accommodation services (-4.7%), package holidays (-2.1%) and petroleum products (liquid fuels were down by 1.8% and fuels and lubricants by 1.4%).

The harmonised index of consumer prices, an EU benchmark, stood at 1.4%, down 0.1 point over the month before. In November 2018 it was 2.1%.