Rates Will Rise, But Let’s Play Some Numberwang On The CPI Too…

Today we got the latest CPI data from the ABS, and it was a bit of a shocker, as the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 3.8 per cent in the 12 months to December 2025, up from 3.4 per cent to November. Trimmed mean inflation was 3.3 per cent in the 12 months to December 2025, up from 3.2 per cent in the 12 months to November 2025. The largest contributor to annual inflation in December was Housing, up 5.5 per cent. This was followed by Food and non-alcoholic beverages, up 3.4 per cent, and Recreation and culture, which rose 4.4 per cent. The policy-relevant trimmed mean inflation rose by 0.9% in the December quarter, which the RBA will still see as the most important measure, and 3.3% in the 12 months to December 2025, up from 3.2% in the 12 months to November 2025. As Alex Joiner from IFM Investors notes, trimmed mean inflation accelerated to 3.9% on a six months annualised basis. “Along with the upside surprise on headline inflation, there’s a strong case for the RBA to hike next week”, Joiner said on Twitter (X). This was expected, and the outturn lifts the probability of a rate rise from the RBA as soon as next week because the results were higher than the RBA had expected, and they were already signalling concern before the hot CPI landed, and of course last week we had the strong jobs report. Recall that the RBA has two mandates: to ensure both price stability and full employment—two goals that often require balancing competing economic pressures. While jobs are tracking with a lower unemployment figure than the RBA expected, inflation is higher. They will need to change their policy rate, higher. http://www.martinnorth.com/ Details of our one to one service are here: https://digitalfinanceanalytics.com/blog/dfa-one-to-one/ Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/ Find more at https://digitalfinanceanalytics.com/blog/ where you can subscribe to our research alerts Please consider supporting our work via Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DigitalFinanceAnalytics The full detailed set of post code data is available as a subscription service. Or make a one-off contribution to help cover our costs via PayPal at: https://www.paypal.me/MartinDFA We also can receive bitcoins at: 13zBL1oRib9VJu8Uc9zUGNhxKDBBgUpDN1 Please share this post to help to spread the word about the state of things.... Caveat Emptor! Note: this is NOT financial or property advice!! 🚨BEWARE OF SCAMMERS🚨 As there are accounts impersonating Walk The World in the comments on YouTube, note that our comments will have a distinguishable verified symbol. And remember that we will never message you asking you to give us money or talk to us on other platforms such as WhatsApp or Telegram