S.Korea annual consumer inflation ticks up in Oct

SEOUL – South Korea’s annual consumer inflation in October ticked up from September against market expectations for no change, government data showed on Wednesday.

The consumer price index (CPI) rose 5.7 percent in October from a year earlier, according to the Statistics Korea data. The rate had slowed in September to 5.6 percent from 5.7 percent in August.

The median forecast in a Reuters survey of economists was for the annual CPI growth to be 5.6 percent in October, although five of the 11 economists polled predicted higher rates.

The CPI rose 0.3 percent in October on a monthly basis, the same rate as in September and higher than a 0.2 percent gain seen in the survey.