{"id":33092,"date":"2012-10-23T16:49:00","date_gmt":"2012-10-23T20:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/forex-news\/2012\/10\/botswana-holds-rate-says-inflation-outlook-is-positive\/"},"modified":"2012-10-23T16:49:00","modified_gmt":"2012-10-23T20:49:00","slug":"botswana-holds-rate-says-inflation-outlook-is-positive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/2012\/10\/23\/botswana-holds-rate-says-inflation-outlook-is-positive\/","title":{"rendered":"Botswana holds rate, says inflation outlook is positive"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Central Bank News<br \/>\n&nbsp; &nbsp; The central bank of Botswana held its benchmark bank rate unchanged at 9.5 percent, saying the medium-term outlook for inflation is positive and the current policy stance should ensure that inflation hits the bank&#8217;s target.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; In the short term, however, the Bank of Botswana expects inflation to exceed its 3-6 percent target range due to temporary increases of administered prices. In September, the annual inflation rate rose to 7.1 percent from 6.6 percent in August due to higher fuel prices.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; &#8220;The underlying trend remains downwards, but, in the circumstances, inflation is now expected to converge to the medium term objective range in the first half of 2013,&#8221; the bank said in a statement after a meeting of its Monetary Policy Committee.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; That forecast, however, could be affected by unanticipated increases in administered prices, higher global food prices, a likely fall in international oil prices and weaker global activity, the bank said.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; The bank said global inflationary pressures had eased and persistent capacity under-utilisation and high unemployment in major countries should have a moderating effect on global inflation.<br \/><a name='more'><\/a><br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Botswana&#8217;s economic output expanded by an annual rate of 8.7 percent in June, with non-mining output up by 12.1 percent while mining output fell 8 percent, the bank said.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; In the second quarter, Gross Domestic Product grew by 8.4 percent from the same 2011 quarter, up from a rate of 6.7 percent in the first quarter.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;But the bank expects non-mining output to remain below potential in the medium-term, reducing inflationary pressures, and domestic demand is also expected to be subdued.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; Botswana&#8217;s central bank last changed its bank rate in November 2010 when it cut the rate by 50 basis points.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.centralbanknews.info\/\" target=\"_blank\"> www.CentralBankNews.info<\/a><\/p>\n<div><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" src=\"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/8290544642025682538-2775693354531713534?l=www.centralbanknews.info\" alt=\"\" \/><\/div><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Central Bank News &nbsp; &nbsp; The central bank of Botswana held its benchmark bank rate unchanged at 9.5 percent, saying the medium-term outlook for inflation is positive and the current policy stance should ensure that inflation hits the bank&#8217;s target.&nbsp; &nbsp; In the short term, however, the Bank of Botswana expects inflation to exceed &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/2012\/10\/23\/botswana-holds-rate-says-inflation-outlook-is-positive\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Botswana holds rate, says inflation outlook is positive&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33092\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}