For economists, and no doubt in the collective memory, the year 2022 will remain that of the great return of inflation. She who had almost disappeared for a quarter of a century. The rise in prices triggered by the magnitude of the post-Covid-19 recovery in mid-2021 has become a lasting and pernicious phenomenon. “What was initially seen as a temporary price recovery after the post-pandemic reopening turned into persistent inflation”notes Gilles Moëc, Chief Economist of the AXA Group and Director of Research at AXA IM, in a note published on 1is december.
At the end of 2022, inflation crossed the 10% mark in the euro zone countries (10.1%, according to Eurostat, at the end of November). A figure, however, in slight decline, the index having reached 10.6% in early October. In France, the energy shield has made it possible to contain the soaring prices a little: over twelve months, it reached 6.2%, according to the Franco-French index (Insee consumer price index).
The harmonized index, which allows fairer comparisons with the rest of the euro zone, stood at 7.1% over one year, at the end of November, against 11.3% in Germany, and up to 23, 1% in Hungary, or more than 21% in the Baltic countries. For consumers, this price increase is all the more penalizing in that it primarily affects products which it is difficult to do without: energy, of course, the one that started it all. Over one year, gas, oil and electricity will have taken on average more than 20%.
heavy weapon
But it also strongly affects food products, which have become the locomotive of inflation since the start of the school year. Fresh produce, meat, fish, vegetables, cereals, groceries will have increased, at the end of December, by 12.5% in France, a figure which is explained by the transmission of energy prices to production or transport costs and by the rise in fertilizers, often derived from petroleum.
Faced with this inflationary crisis, the central banks have pulled out heavy weapons. In 2022, they carried out the strongest tightening of monetary policy since the financial crisis of 2008-2009. But the weapon of interest rates does not produce an immediate reaction: it takes several quarters to see inflation slow down. Within the euro zone, economists place the peak in the first half of 2023.
In France, “Inflation will persist and accelerate” at the beginning of 2023, warns Stéphane Colliac, economist at BNP Paribas. Indeed, the French will be confronted at the beginning of the year with the flip side of the tariff shield set up in 2022 – precisely to protect them from inflation. The discount of 10 euro cents granted at the pump on a liter of fuel will disappear under the blare of New Year’s Eve.
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