Consumer prices in Brazil rose by 1.01 percent in February, higher than markets’ expectations and the biggest jump on record for the month since 2015. The results kept the year-on-year inflation rate in the double digits, at 10.54 percent.
In February, education items were the main inflation drivers, due to a hike in tuition fees as the new school year kicked off.
Worse than the February rise of the IPCA benchmark consumer price index is the fact that there is little indication inflation will let up any time soon. Prices have gone up in every single urban center surveyed by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. Moreover, the Russian invasion of Ukraine has led to massive surges in commodity prices, and Petrobras has just announced its biggest fuel price hikes since 2016.
Over the past 12 months, fuel prices have accumulated a 33-percent surge. While fuel inflation slowed down in February (down 0.92 percent) the liter of gasoline and diesel could become 7 and 15 percent more expensive, respectively.
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