SYDNEY, Aug 1: Australia’s official statistics agency has revised down a key measure of underlying inflation after discovering an error in the data, suggesting there might be even more scope for interest rates cuts to stimulate the economy.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) said it has revised down the weighted median measure of consumer prices to show a rise of 0.6 percent in the second quarter, from the originally reported 0.7 percent.
There were also revisions both up and down to past quarterly changes, which left the annual pace of growth in the weighted median unrevised at 2.6 percent for the second quarter.
The downward revision to the weighted median brought it more in line with what analysts had been forecasting and underlined the benign outlook for inflation in Australia.
That should reassure the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA)which is widely expected to cut interest rates to a record low of 2.5 percent next week, taking advantage of tame inflation to support economic growth.
The ABS said the error was caused by its use of original rather than seasonally adjusted figures in the household textiles expenditure class when it calculated inflation.
‘The ABS have instigated a full review of the circumstances leading up to the release to understand why the error occurred and to prevent it from happening again,’ the agency said in a brief statement.
(AGENCIES)
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