Russian Central Bank gives inflation forecast for first quarter of 2019

The Russian Central Bank expects annual inflation to reach 5.5–6% in January-March and to slow down later in the year without "extreme" divergence from the forecast, the bank's first deputy chairperson Ksenia Yudayeva said.

"Annual inflation will amount to 5.5–6% in the first quarter," Prime cited her as saying.

Yudayeva added that an earlier than expected occurrence of some pro-inflation factors resulted in inflation overshooting the forecast of 4.2% in 2018.

The Federal Statistics Service said earlier in January that in 2018 Russia’s inflation amounted to 4.3%.