Quantification of the data obtained in a survey conducted by national stats office GUS in H1 of May puts the average inflation index as expected by consumers over the next 12 months at 0.5% - the same as in March and April, according to the National Bank of Poland (NBP).

These expectations have remained low for a whole year, running below the lower tolerance band for deviations from the NBP inflation target (2.5% +/-1pp).

The quantification procedure, which translates the respondents’ subjective perceptions into the language of official inflation statistics, assumes that at the time of the latest survey, respondents’ perception of price changes in the preceding 12 months equalled the CPI index, which was available at the time of the survey (0.7%).

As from January 2014, the measure of consumer inflation expectations has been based on a relevant GUS survey. Until the end of 2013, NBP analysts used corresponding survey data provided by the company Ipsos, which had at its disposal the longest time series of survey data on Polish consumers' expectations. At the beginning of 2014, Ipsos discontinued the consumer surveys from which the data were sourced. The change of the source of survey data on the anticipated price movements has no material impact on the assessment of consumer inflation expectations, as the expected inflation measures quantified with both Ipsos and GUS data have been very similar so far.