The latest data released by the National Bureau of Statistics shows that in July, the national consumer price index (CPI) turned from a decrease in month-on-month, up 0.4%, and remained the same year-on-year; the core CPI, excluding food and energy prices, rose 0.8% year-on-year, and the increase expanded for three consecutive months. What positive signals can be read from the July price data?
Experts said that in July, the effect of policy on expanding domestic demand continued to appear, coupled with the in-depth advancement of the construction of a unified national market, prices in the consumer sector continued to show positive changes, and there were signs of marginal improvement in price operations.
Dong Lijuan, chief statistician of the Urban Department of the National Bureau of Statistics, introduced that the CPI remained unchanged year-on-year, mainly affected by the low food prices. Affected by the high price base in the same period last year, food prices fell by 1.6% year-on-year, an increase of 1.3 percentage points from the previous month, affecting the CPI decline by about 0.29 percentage points year-on-year.
CPI rose 0.4% month-on-month, an increase of 0.1 percentage point higher than the seasonal level. Dong Lijuan analyzed that the month-on-month increase was mainly driven by the rise in prices of services and industrial consumer goods. Service prices rose by 0.6% month-on-month, affecting the CPI increase by about 0.26 percentage points month-on-month, accounting for more than 60% of the total CPI increase. Affected by the peak summer travel season, the month-on-month increase in the prices of air tickets, tourism, hotel accommodation and transportation rental fees are all higher than the seasonal level.
The prices of industrial consumer goods rose by 0.5% month-on-month, an increase of 0.4 percentage points from the previous month, affecting the CPI increase by about 0.17 percentage points month-on-month. Dong Lijuan analyzed that a series of policies to boost consumption have driven demand to continue to recover, and combined with the end of the "618" promotion, the prices of industrial consumer goods deducted from energy rose by 0.2%. Among them, the prices of fuel-fired cars and new energy cars have both turned from a decline of more than five consecutive months to a flat price, and the prices of household appliances, entertainment durable consumer goods, etc. have increased month-on-month between 0.5% and 2.2%.
Core CPI continues to rebound year-on-year. "The core CPI, excluding food and energy prices, rose 0.8% year-on-year, and the increase continued to expand by 0.1 percentage point from the previous month, the highest since March 2024," said Dong Lijuan.
