S.Africa CPI hits 20-month high at 6.1%

South Africa’s targeted consumer inflation breached the central bank’s (CB’s) 3 to 6 per cent target in November as expected, complicating the Reserve Bank’s strategy to keep it in check by raising rates when growth is expected to be weak.November consumer inflation quickened to 6.1 per cent Year-on-Year, (Y-o-Y) from 6 per cent in October, a level last seen in January 2010, Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday.Economists surveyed by a news agency had expected headline year-on-year (y-o-y) inflation to accelerate to 6.2 per cent and slow to 0.3 on a monthly basis.Stats S.A. said headline CPI slowed as expected to 0.3 per cent on a month on month basis, from 0.5 per cent in October.A weak rand was the reason behind the driving prices to great heights and could push prices above the central bank’s projected peak of 6.3 per cent.“If the rand weakens then forecasts will rise across the board,” said Carmen Altenkirch, an economist at Nedbank, adding the Reserve Bank will not necessarily raise rates in response.“The Reserve Bank will continue having to juggle very weak growth against rising inflation and as long as inflation is driven by external factors and there’s limited evidence of second-round effects, they will probably keep interest rates low for longer. We’ve revised our interest rate rise to November from July.”The central bank said last month the rising costs of imports would likely drive inflation to peak at 6.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2012, however they were watching and not reacting to inflation for the moment.The rand has lost about 25 per cent against the dollar since the start of the year mostly on risk aversion related to the European debt crisis.The currency was slightly firmer against the dollar at 8.3162 by 0840 GMT on Wednesday but was within a recent range and analysts say as long as the debt crisis festers, risk aversion is likely to drive investors to traditionally safe assets like the dollar.Dealers say they had already priced in the acceleration in consumer prices.