By Justine Irish D. Tabile, <\/b>Senior Reporter<\/i><\/p>\n
SHARP increases in fuel, electricity, and a few food prices, together with a weaker peso, could have driven Philippine inflation to its fastest pace in greater than two years, analysts said.<\/p>\n
A BusinessWorld <\/i>poll of 17 analysts yielded a median estimate of 5.5% for the patron price index in April, accelerating from the 4.1% in March and 1.4% a 12 months ago.<\/p>\n
This can be a tad below the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas\u2019 (BSP) 5.6%-6.4% forecast for the month.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bworldonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/260504Analysts_Inflation-1024x1022.jpg\")
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If realized, the headline print could be the fastest in over two and a half years or because the 6.1% seen in September 2023.<\/p>\n
April would also mark the second straight month that inflation settled above the central bank\u2019s 2%-4% goal.<\/p>\n
The Philippine Statistics Authority will release the April inflation data on Tuesday, May 5.<\/p>\n
\u201cHigher petroleum, transport and choose food prices are the important thing culprits for the uptick,\u201d Emilio S. Neri, Jr., lead economist of the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI), said.<\/p>\n
Fuel prices remained elevated in April, because the Middle East war continued. The Philippines, as a net oil importer of crude oil, makes it extremely vulnerable to global crude price swings.<\/p>\n
\u201cFuel and transport also exerted upward pressure amid volatile global oil prices. These outweighed easing base effects, keeping headline inflation elevated,\u201d Union Bank of the Philippines Chief Economist Ruben Carlo O. Asuncion said.<\/p>\n
Pump price adjustments in April resulted in a net decrease of P0.58 per liter for gasoline, P28.18 per liter for diesel, and P17.71 per liter for kerosene.<\/p>\n
Security Bank Financial Markets Segment Research Head and Chief Economist Angelo B. Taningco said April inflation was also driven by higher electricity rates, in addition to the peso depreciation.<\/p>\n
Manila Electric Co. raised rates by P0.5335 per kilowatt-hour (kWh), bringing the general rate to P14.3496 per kWh for April.<\/p>\n
The peso closed at P61.485 a dollar on April 30, weakening by 73.7 centavos from its P60.748 close on March 31. It hit a record low of P61.567 on April 29.<\/p>\n
Deepali Bhargava, regional head of research for Asia-Pacific at ING, said higher rice prices are one other source of inflationary pressures as Asian rice prices are going up as a consequence of soaring prices of fuel and fertilizer.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSupply constraints are more likely to intensify as fertilizer shortages persist, exacerbating upward pressure on rice prices and adding further to overall inflation within the Philippines,\u201d she said in an e-mail.<\/span><\/p>\n Rice prices further climbed in April, with the common cost of normal milled rice rising by 15.9% to P51.53 within the April 15 to 17 period from P44.44 a 12 months earlier.<\/p>\n The worth of well-milled rice jumped by 15.3% 12 months on 12 months to P58.88 a kilo, while the worth of special rice rose by an annual 9.8% to P66.23 per kilo.<\/p>\n Domini S. Velasquez, chief economist at China Banking Corp., said she sees inflation accelerating to six.2%, citing upward pressure from higher prices of key food items equivalent to meat, fruits, eggs and cooking oil, in addition to a hike in water rates.<\/span><\/p>\n The Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System Regulatory Office approved a rate hike of P0.04 per cubic meter (cu.m.) for Manila Water Co., Inc. and a rise of P0.09 per cu.m. for Maynilad Water Services, Inc. The speed adjustments were implemented starting April 1. <\/span><\/p>\n MORE RATE HIKES \u201cWe expect inflation to stay above the goal range. The BSP may not tighten at every meeting, but it would maintain a transparent tightening bias,\u201d said Alpine Macro Chief Emerging Markets & China Strategist Yan Wang in an e-mail.<\/p>\n BPI\u2019s Mr. Neri said the BSP\u2019s latest rate hike will help temper inflation expectations.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cRather a lot more rate hikes might be needed, with outsized intermeeting or off-cycle hikes even possible,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The central bank hiked its key rate for the primary time in over two years in a policy meeting on April 23, bringing the benchmark rate to 4.5%.<\/p>\n \u201cInflation will likely be above the 2-4% goal band for the remainder of the 12 months. Our recent rate outlook pencils in two more 25-basis-point hikes this 12 months to bring the policy rate to five%, though risks are tilted towards more hikes if tensions escalate within the Middle East,\u201d said University of Asia and the Pacific Economist Marco Antonio C. Agonia in an e-mail.<\/p>\n Mr. Asuncion said the speed hike will help \u201climit second-round effects, anchor expectations, and support currency and financial stability over the medium term.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Sun Life Investment Management and Trust Corp. Economist Patrick M. Ella said policy rates have a slow impact over time.<\/p>\n \u201cInflation can have to be above the BSP upper-bond tolerance rate for an prolonged period, hence seeing more rate hikes \u2026 I see a full 12 months between a complete of two to three rate hikes,\u201d he said in an e-mail.<\/span><\/p>\n The central bank is now expecting the headline print to stay above 5% for the remainder of the 12 months, amid price pressures from elevated oil costs and second-round inflation effects.<\/p>\n If the BusinessWorld <\/i>poll\u2019s median forecast materializes, headline inflation would average 3.5% as of April, still below the BSP\u2019s revised inflation estimate of 6.3% for your entire 12 months.<\/p>\n \u201cPrivate consumption within the Philippines stays on a weak footing. The central bank will likely control the extent to which weak demand could stem the spillover effects of food and energy on inflation,\u201d said HSBC Global Investment Research Senior ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Economist Aris D. Dacanay in an e-mail.<\/span><\/p>\n Nevertheless, Pantheon Macroeconomics Chief Emerging Asia Economist Miguel Chanco said that inflation above the goal range shouldn’t immediately lead to further rate hikes.<\/p>\n \u201cI do expect inflation to stay above the goal range for a while this 12 months, but that doesn\u2019t necessarily mean that the BSP should proceed to hike rates, as the probabilities of this supply-side-induced inflation shock filtering through to stronger demand-side price pressures are very small, given the still-weak state of the economy,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Maybank Investment Bank Economist Azril Rosli, who estimates April inflation at 5%, said inflation could also be approaching its peak, \u201creducing the urgency for immediate further tightening.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs such, the BSP may opt to pause at its next meeting to evaluate the impact of recent policy actions, while retaining a tightening bias should inflation prove more persistent,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n The Monetary Board will hold its next policy review on June 18.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Motorcycle riders queue at a gasoline station in Quezon City, March 20, 2026. \u2014 PHILIPPINE STAR\/MIGUEL DE GUZMAN By Justine Irish D. Tabile, Senior Reporter SHARP increases in fuel, electricity, and a few food prices, together with a weaker peso, could have driven Philippine inflation to its fastest pace in greater than two years, analysts […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":328934,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[24836,11981,9131,2047,17105,7677],"class_list":["post-328933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-2year","tag-accelerated","tag-april","tag-high","tag-inflation","tag-poll"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328933"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328933\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":328936,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328933\/revisions\/328936"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/b>With inflation more likely to stay elevated in the following few months, several analysts see the BSP remaining on a tightening path.<\/p>\n