{"id":49311,"date":"2014-04-02T08:08:09","date_gmt":"2014-04-02T12:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/forex-news\/?p=49311"},"modified":"2014-04-02T08:08:09","modified_gmt":"2014-04-02T12:08:09","slug":"uganda-holds-rate-sees-lower-short-term-inflation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/2014\/04\/02\/uganda-holds-rate-sees-lower-short-term-inflation\/","title":{"rendered":"Uganda holds rate, sees lower short-term inflation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By <a href=\"http:\/\/ift.tt\/1iP0FNb\"><u>CentralBankNews.info<\/u><\/a><br \/>\n&nbsp; &nbsp;Uganda&#8217;s central bank maintained its Central Bank Rate (CBR) at 11.5 percent, saying its neutral policy stance is warranted given its current projections for inflation and economic growth.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; The Bank of Uganda (BOU), which last cut its rate by 50 basis points in December for a net 50 point reduction in 2013, revised downward its forecast for core inflation to 4-5 percent over the next few months from February&#8217;s forecast of 5-6 percent in the first half of the year after headline and core inflation eased in February due to a strengthening of the exchange rate.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; But over the next 12 months, the BOU still sees core inflation rising to between 5.5 and 6.5 percent and cited potential risks of stronger inflation from a deprecation of the exchange rate, stronger domestic demand from the fiscal sector and higher food prices due to drought and regional food shortfalls.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; &#8220;The magnitude and timing of possible declines in foreign aid are also a source of uncertainty for the balance of payments and the economy,&#8221; the BOU said.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; In its monetary policy statement, the BOU referred to a decline in February headline inflation to 6.7 percent from 6.9 percent in January while core inflation fell to 3.7 percent from 4.6 percent.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp;But on Monday the bank said, citing Uganda&#8217;s statistics bureau, headline inflation rose to 7.1 percent in March from a revised 6.8 percent in February while core inflation fell to 3.7 percent in March from a revised 3.9 percent in February.<br \/><a name='more'><\/a><br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; The BOU targets core inflation of 5.0 percent.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; Uganda&#8217;s shilling appreciated by 6.2 percent in 2013 but since late February it has declined, trading at 2,545 to the U.S. dollar today compared with 2,525 at the end of 2013.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; The bank said economic growth in the current 2013\/14 fiscal year, which ends on June 30, is still projected to be relatively buoyant, supported by fiscal stimulus, a stronger global environment, strong inflows of foreign direct investment and household consumption. However, it said weak bank credit growth posed a risk to this outlook.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; The BOU has forecast growth of 6.0-6.5 percent in the current fiscal year.<br \/>&nbsp; &nbsp; Uganda&#8217;s Gross Domestic Product contracted by 0.6 percent in the third calendar quarter from the second quarter for annual growth of 2.2 percent, down from 5.8 percent in the second quarter.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp; &nbsp; <a href=\"http:\/\/ift.tt\/1iP0FNb\">http:\/\/ift.tt\/1iP0FNb<\/a><\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By CentralBankNews.info &nbsp; &nbsp;Uganda&#8217;s central bank maintained its Central Bank Rate (CBR) at 11.5 percent, saying its neutral policy stance is warranted given its current projections for inflation and economic growth.&nbsp; &nbsp; The Bank of Uganda (BOU), which last cut its rate by 50 basis points in December for a net 50 point reduction in &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/2014\/04\/02\/uganda-holds-rate-sees-lower-short-term-inflation\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Uganda holds rate, sees lower short-term inflation&#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-49311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49311","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=49311"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49311\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}