アメリカ民主主義さんの おぼえた日記 - 2024年9月12日(木)

＜BBCニュース9月12日＞
US inflation falls to lowest in over three years
アメリカのインフレ率この3年で最低に

◎要旨
先月のアメリカのインフレ率が沈静化し、石油価格や中古車価格の減少で過去12カ月の消費者物価上昇率は2.5％となった。これで来週、中央銀行が利下げすることは確実となった。ただし、家賃は予想外の上昇となり、サービス価格は高止まりしていることから、金利の大幅引き下げの可能性は少なくなった。
Inflation in the US continued to cool last month, official figures showed, raising confidence that the US central bank will cut interest rates next week.
Consumer prices rose 2.5% over the 12 months to August, as prices for petrol, used cars and trucks, and some other items fell.
That marked the slowest pace since February 2021 and was down from 2.9% in July, despite an unexpected rise in housing costs.
The Labor Department figures come during a presidential campaign in which rising living costs have been a key issue.
Analysts said the data increased the likelihood that the Federal Reserve would cut interest rates by 0.25 percentage points at its meeting next week, but reduced the odds of bigger cut.
"Overall, inflation appears to have been successfully tamed but, with housing inflation still refusing to moderate as quickly as hoped, it hasn’t been completely vanquished," said Paul Ashworth, chief North America economist for Capital Economics.
The data shows price pressure is fading for key household items.
Grocery prices, which were surging just a few years ago, were unchanged from July to August and are up less than 1% from a year ago, according to the report.
The cost of petrol, another staple, has also dropped, falling over the month and more than 10% from August 2023.
However, prices for other items continued to climb.
Not including food and energy - which tend to fluctuate and can obscure underlying trends - prices were up 3.2% over the year, as airline tickets, car insurance, rent, and other housing costs grew more expensive.
"This serves as a bit of a reminder not to get too carried away with a few months of better inflation data," said Brian Coulton, Fitch Rating's chief economist.
"Certainly not enough to stop the Fed cutting rates later this month, but the stickiness of services inflation... will be one reason why the Fed will not be cutting rates at an aggressive pace over the next year or so."
Central banks, including the Fed, started upping borrowing costs two years ago in an attempt to slow inflation.
Prices began to rise globally in 2021 because of pandemic-related supply issues and a jump in government spending.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 then caused oil prices to surge, further fuelling global inflation.
US inflation hit a high of 9.1% in June 2022, but has since fallen closer to the 2% rate considered healthy.
'They've got red tags on everything'

◎私見
自民党の総裁選挙が告示され、史上最多の9名が立候補した。候補者乱立で最初の投票の議員票は確実に割れるので、決選投票になるだろう。そして、1位2位の対決になるだろうが、ここでも、党員票がものを言いそうだ。そうなると、人気がある小泉氏が首位で、岩盤支持層を持つ高市氏が残ると予想する。ただ、決選投票では議員票が勝ち馬に乗るので、選挙の顔になりやすい小泉氏が当選と予想する。結果は如何に。