By www.CentralBankNews.info
Armenia’s central bank held its benchmark refinancing rate steady at 8.0 percent, saying inflation should rise in the first half of this year to stabilize around the bank’s 4.0 percent target over its 12-month forecast horizon.
The Central Bank of Armenia (CBA), which has held its rate steady since September 2011, said in a statement from Feb. 12 that it expects the global economy to slowly recover while the prices of raw materials and food remain relatively stable.
Armenia’s inflation rate eased to 2.6 percent in January, down from December’s 3.2 percent. The CBA targets inflation with a midpoint of 4.0 percent, within a 1.5 percentage point confidence band.
Armenia’s Gross Domestic Product expanded by an annual rate of 9.3 percent in the third quarter, up from 6.6 percent in the second.
In December the CBA said growth in 2012 was likely to have been 7-7.4 percent and over the next two years it expects annual growth of 5-6 percent, with domestic demand up 4.8 percent in 2013 and public spending up by a real 7.4 percent.