The Executive Board of the Central Bank of Tunisia (BCT), at its meeting Tuesday, February 19, 2019, decided to raise the central bank’s interest rate by 100 basis points to 7.75% by year.
The BCT had emphasized in its last analysis of the economic and monetary developments, published last December, that the persistence of core inflation at high levels is a source of concern for the CenBank, whose mandate is to ensure price stability.
“It remains vigilant about the future evolution of inflation and would not hesitate to tighten its monetary policy in order to reduce the rate of inflation to its desired level, thus acting on inflationary expectations.”
However, the core inflation rate (excluding food and energy) stood at 7.1% in January 2019, compared to 7.9% in December 2018, i.e. a decrease of 0.8 percentage points.
In addition, the BCT raised its key rate twice in 2018. The first increase was decided in March (+75 basis points) and the second in June (+100 basis points).
