Days ago, Economy Minister
Luis Caputo
said that March inflation will be close to 10%, which would mark the third consecutive decline in the index, which went from 25.5% in December to 20.6% in January and there at 13.2% in February. From the Treasury Palace they celebrate that the slowdown in food is more marked than in the rest of the items, which
opens the chances that this month the desired single-digit record will be reached.
For Caputo, inflation “
is really collapsing, the core is in single digits. There are no longer macroeconomic reasons for there to be inflation
.”
In the measurement of the consulting firm EcoGo, in March
"the recession surpassed seasonality"
and although it is usually a month with higher inflation than February, this time that did not happen. Thus, it registered 12.5, with an increase for Food and Beverages of 10.7%.
Although inflation remains high,
preliminary data for April seem to prove the government right
. The survey of food prices by the consulting firm LCG showed weekly inflation of
0.4%, 0.4 percentage points lower than the previous week.
This percentage hides 4 days in March and 3 in April (only one business day), since the survey is carried out on Wednesdays.
LCG specifies that a large part of the slowdown
is due to the drop in Beverages (-3.7%), which subtracted 0.5 percentage points from weekly inflation.
In monthly terms, "the average increase is 8.5%, maintaining the downward trend of the last three weeks." In this way, the index crossed the 10% monthly threshold after 20 weeks (from the third of November 2023).
Another fact that supports the slowdown in food is that in the first week of April,
25% of products registered an increase,
two points less than the average of the last four weeks (27%). However, even with this moderation, these adjustment percentages are equivalent to assuming that
the total basket increases every 3.7 weeks.
For the Bahía Blanca Economic Studies Center, in the first week of April,
the food and beverage category registered a variation of 2%.
Compared to the previous week, the products that increased the most were potatoes with 18.5%, water with 10.3% and rice with 10.1%. At the same time, there were drops of 5% in oranges, 6% in coffee and 6.9% in butter.
According to the Econviews price survey, which measures a basket of food, cleaning and perfumery in supermarkets,
the month began with a weekly variation of 0.8%
. In the first week of March the increase had been 2.2%.
The economist Fernando Marull, director of the consulting firm FMyA, closed
inflation at 12.1%
for March , with Food closer to 10%.
"April would be the last month of strong rate increases, since gas increases of around 350% average for residential were finally confirmed.
This would contribute almost 2 points to general inflation
, which we project at 11% monthly. In the case particular of Food will continue below 10%".
Fall in consumption
The brake on food is in tune with the collapse in consumption. According to CAME data, in March retail sales
fell 12.6% annually compared to the same month last year, at constant prices
, and accumulated a drop of 22.1% in the first quarter of the year. In the monthly comparison, they decreased 3.2%.
Food sales fell 15.5% annually in March
, at constant prices and accumulated a decline of 28.7% in the first three months of the year, compared to the same period in 2023. In the month-on-month comparison, they declined 2.7% .
Federico Moll, director of Ecolatina, contributes that "
mass consumption in supermarkets is probably declining
and from now on salaries will probably begin to beat supermarket inflation. Mass consumption was the first to change its relative price. Now It's up to the rates and by paying more rates, less money is available for other purchases.
"We are going to see single-digit inflation quickly. In March, we are going to have single-digit inflation in the core and wholesale.
And it is extremely likely that we will have single-digit inflation in April,"
said economist Fausto Spotorno. .