Consumer and wholesale prices were up in May (as expected), with retail inflation slightly higher than the upper range of the government's target, while bank lending also rose faster than anticipated, though down from April's levels, according to data released today.
Consumer prices rose 3.1% in May from a year earlier (exceeding expectations for an upper bound of 3% in CPI), while wholesale prices (PPI) rose 7.1%, according to figures from the National Bureau of Statistics. The PPI increase was more than the expected 6.9% gain, according to a Dow Jones Newswire survey.
