MAS likely to hold in July as Singapore’s May core inflation undershoots forecasts: economists

[SINGAPORE] The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is likely to hold monetary policy settings steady at its July meeting, private-sector economists said on Tuesday (Jun 23), after core inflation held at 1.4 per cent in May, defying forecasts of an acceleration.

Data from the Singapore Department of Statistics showed core inflation unchanged from April, coming in below the 1.6 per cent median estimate in a Bloomberg poll of private-sector economists.

MAS and the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) said in a joint statement that the reading was largely due to lower services inflation, which offset higher food and retail and other goods inflation.