Vietnam's CPI to rise by 0.49%

Vietnam's consumer price index (CPI), a measure of the inflation, is estimated to rise only 0.49 percent in October over the previous month, reported the General Statistics Office (GSO) on Friday. Insiders said despite a number of factors that were expected to push the index higher, October's CPI rise is actually much lower than that in September (1.06 percent) and August (0.83 percent). As a result, October CPI would increase by 5.14 percent from December 2012, and by 5.92 percent from October last year. Nine out of 11 groups of commodities used to calculate the CPI increased in October, with food and foodstuff rising the most, while price of transport dropped by 0.17 percent. CPI in urban areas posted slower growth than in rural areas, at 0.42 percent, compared to 0.54 percent. Not included in the CPI calculation, gold prices in October decreased 2.87 percent, and U.S. dollar price edged down 0.18 percent from the previous month.