TEHRAN - The Statistical Center of Iran (SCI) expects the inflation rate in the country to experience a downward trend in the first quarter of the coming Iranian calendar year (starts on March 19), IRNA reported on Monday.

The SCI has estimated the annual and point-to-point inflation rates using three different scenarios, all of which forecast the future inflation rates using the data from the previous similar time spans and comparing them to the present situation.

In the first scenario, the inflation for the Q1 of the upcoming Iranian calendar year of 1399 has been estimated based on the data from the similar period of time (Q1) in the current calendar year 1398 (started on March 21, 2019) and the last month of the previous calendar year 1397 (February 20-March 20, 2019).

The second scenario uses the same method but the data from the two previous years are considered, while the third one uses an average of the two above-mentioned scenarios.

According to the data released by SCI, based on the first scenario, the country’s annual inflation rate which is currently 35.1 percent for the current Iranian calendar month of Esfand (February 20-March 19, 2020) will fall to 29.2 percent in the end of the next calendar year’s Q1 (June 20, 2020).

Point-to-point inflation is also seen to fall from the current 25 percent to 24.6 percent on the said date.

Based on the second scenario, point-to-point and annual inflation rates are seen to drop to 18.1 percent and 26.6 percent, respectively, while according to the third scenario the rates are going to fall to 21.7 percent and 27.9 percent, respectively.

In its latest report released back in February, SCI had put the inflation rate in the twelve-month period ended on February 19, which marks the end of the eleventh Iranian calendar month of Bahman, at 37 percent.

The report indicated that the inflation rate had fallen 1.6 percent in the mentioned time span from the twelve-month period ended in the last day of the tenth Iranian month of Dey.

EF/MA