OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada’s annual inflation rate accelerated to 4.7% in October, the highest since February 2003, and up from a year-over-year pace of 4.4% in September, Statistics Canada said on Wednesday.
Analysts polled by Reuters had expected the annual rate to rise to 4.7%. October marked the seventh consecutive month in which headline inflation topped the Bank of Canada’s 1-3% targeted range.
CPI common, which the central bank calls the best gauge of the economy’s underperformance, was unchanged at 1.8%.
The Bank of Canada signaled last month that it could hike its overnight interest rate as early as April 2022, while warning inflation was likely to rise further this year and stay above target through most of next year.
The Canadian dollar was trading 0.1% lower at C$1.2575 to the greenback, or 79.52 U.S. cents, after the data.
(Reporting by Julie Gordon and David Ljunggren in Ottawa and Fergal Smith in Toronto; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Bernadette Baum)
