UK Consumer Prices Grow at Fastest Pace in Almost Three Decades

Source: Office for National Statistics

Consumer prices in the United Kingdom closed in 2021 with the highest growth in almost 30 years, still impacted by the COVID-19 lockdowns imposed in the previous year. EWU is up 0.12% premarket.

• Annual inflation clocked in at 5.4% in December 2021, up from 5.1% in November and 0.6% the same month in 2020. This is the highest since March 1992.
• Price increases were recorded in transport, food and non-alcoholic beverages, furniture and household goods, and housing and household services.
• The Consumer Prices Index, including owner occupiers’ housing costs, climbed by 4.8%, marking the highest since September 2008’s 4.8%.
• The ONS attributed the surge to the influence of the effects of the COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020 when prices for some items were low.
• Compared with the previous month, both the CPI and the CPIH grew by 0.5%.