No respite for RBI as inflation to quicken in slowing India

Bloomberg

India’s inflation is seen accelerating in the final reading on consumer prices before the central bank decides on interest rates next month, complicating matters for Governor Urjit Patel amid increasing evidence that economic growth is weak.
Consumer prices probably rose 3.24 percent in August from a year earlier, according to the median of 36 estimates in a Bloomberg survey of economists before data due at 5.30 pm in New Delhi on Tuesday. That’s faster than the previous month’s 2.4 percent and near the upper end of the Reserve Bank of India’s 2 percent to 3.5 percent projection for April to September.
Industrial production, also due on Tuesday, is estimated to have grown 1.7 percent in July, better than June’s contraction yet well below the 10-year average of
4.9 percent.
The data comes at a time when India’s economic expansion has slumped to the lowest since 2014 as a November cash ban in 2016 and new nationwide sales tax hamper activity. That may push Prime Minister Narendra Modi to boost spending, imperiling the budget deficit target, as well as compel the Reserve Bank of India to cut interest rates in the final quarter of 2017, according to
Citigroup Inc.
“Between a negative shock to growth from fiscal tightening and risks of fiscal slippage, we think that the government may consider the latter given an already fragile macro environment,” said Samiran Chakraborty, an economist at Citi.
He lowered India’s growth
estimate for the year through March 2018 to 7 percent from
7.5 percent.
Data on Thursday is expected to show wholesale price inflation accelerated to 3.2 percent in August from 1.9 percent the previous month, indicating pipeline pressures are building. However, low food and energy prices will keep India’s price pressures below the 4 percent mid-point of the RBI’s medium-term target, according to Moody’s Analytics.
The RBI is scheduled to announce its next rate decision on October 4. Swap traders aren’t pricing in a cut in 2017 but see a possible reduction over the next 12 months, according to markets tracked by HSBC Holdings Plc.