YEREVAN, July 13. /ARKA/. The Central Bank of Armenia decided Tuesday to leave the present 7.25% refinancing rate unchanged, the central bank’s press office reports.
According to the press release sent to ARKA News Agency, Armenia enjoyed 0.8% deflation in June, compared with May.
As a result, year-on-year inflation was recorded at 5.8% in June – 0.5 percentage points lower than that of the previous month.
The board of the central bank thinks that a consistent tightening of monetary conditions since the beginning of this year, the fall in world prices for foods and raw materials and a gradual elimination of expansionary effect of the 2009 monetary, tax and budget policies have lowered year-on-year inflation faster than expected.
However, inflation is still higher than the set benchmark.
The board thinks that despite the expected continuation of these factors, gradual recovery of gross demand in 2010 and prices for season agricultural products will form inflation pressure.
Along with that, future behavior of European currency and world prices for foods and raw materials remains obscure.
That is why the central bank’s board found it reasonable to refrain from changing the refinancing rate.
The central bank has raised it five times over this year from 5.0 to 7.25 percent – by 0.5 percentage points on January 21, February 16, March 9 and April 13 each time and by 0.25 on May 11. –0—
