Inflation to hit 3.9% in 2023: survey

In March, consumers expected a 4.1% inflation for 2023.

Singaporean consumers now expect 2023 headline inflation to clock in at 3.9%, down from their previous forecast of 4.1% in March.

For core inflation, Singaporeans expect it to come at 3.9% in 2023, as of June.

The expectations are similar to the median forecasts of the Monetary Authority of Singapore Survey of Professional Forecasters (MAS SPF) of 3% for CPI Al-Items and 2.8% for MAS Core Inflation.

According to the Singapore Index of Inflation Expectations Survey by DBS and Singapore Management University (SMU), Singaporeans feel that "overall economic growth will be dampened moderately in the medium term" thus the lower inflation expectation in June.

"They are expecting that some price increases might lead to slightly higher expense with some adjustment in consumption baskets," SMU Assistant Professor of Finance and founding Principal Investigator of the DBS-SKBI SInDEx Project, Aurobindo Ghosh, commented.

Inflation expectations of all individual components remained at 5.0%, except for Transportation which slipped to 8.0% from 9.0% in March.

READ MORE: Consumers expect inflation to continue for another full year

The findings, however, suggest that components such as Food, Housing and Utilities and Household Durables and Services, will see a limited increase in inflation expectations in the months to come.

"This perhaps indicates that even though their One-year-Ahead inflation expectations are somewhat reducing, their allocation to consumption basket will increase, for these specific components. The overall impact might increase their spending slightly," the study revealed.