Singapore's Nov. CPI Jumps Up To 4.2 Percent, Highest Since 1982

Victoria City, Hong Kong (AHN) - For Singaporeans this may be an expensive Christmas as the country's Consumer Price Index (CPI) in November shot up to 4.2 percent, which is 25-year high rate, from a year earlier.

The data was released by the Singapore Department of Statistics (SDS) on Monday showed that inflation even went over October's 3.6 percent increase.

The report indicates that the residents are paying more for food and transportation even compared to the last year's data on an average which have been around 1.9 percent.

Individually, food prices went up by 5.2 percent in November, whereas the transport and communication climbed up to 5.6 percent.

"We are seeing broad-based increases in inflation, not just in one or two items," Kit Wei Zheng, an economist at Citigroup Inc. in Singapore, told Bloomberg.

"We'll see more inflation pressures in December and January, and the bias is towards further appreciation in the currency."

Market analysts and the Singapore government revised their forecast for 2008, which is higher than this year's average, in between 3 and 5 percent.