\u2018A luxury\u2019: Woman\u2019s shock at $700 power bill<\/a><\/p>\nThe potential pivot comes hard on the heels of the Board\u2019s December hold at 3.6 per cent. <\/p>\n
As recently as November, a survey of 33 economists pointed to rates staying at or below current levels through the first half of 2026. <\/p>\n
Today, markets are pricing a 72 per cent chance of a hike at tomorrow\u2019s meeting and it was a single month that changed everything. <\/p>\n
![\"\"\/](\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg)
<\/p>\n
December\u2019s inflation print snapped what looked like a promising downtrend. <\/p>\n
Headline inflation rose to 3.8 per cent from November\u2019s 3.4 per cent, while the trimmed mean ticked up from 3.2 per cent to 3.3 per cent \u2013 both still above the RBA\u2019s 2\u20133 per cent target band.<\/p>\n
Even the Board didn\u2019t see the speed of the turn coming. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
December minutes flagged \u201csigns of a more broadly based pick\u2011up in inflation\u201d and acknowledged \u201cthe risks to inflation have tilted to the upside\u201d, but stressed it would take \u201ca little longer to assess the persistence of inflationary pressures\u201d and that the impact of past rate increases was \u201cyet to flow through fully\u201d.<\/p>\n
If the RBA hikes today, it would signal the Board underestimated how quickly it needed to abandon a\u2011wait-and-see\u2011approach. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe Board said in December they needed \u2018a little longer to assess\u2019 inflation persistence. One month later, they may not wait,\u201d bheja.ai CEO and Founder Pravin Mahajan said. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The RBA board will meet today with experts tipping a rate rise is on the cards.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the RBA hikes (today), it would represent the second-fastest policy flip in their history. \u201cFor borrowers with a $750,000 mortgage, a 25 basis point hike would add approximately $115 to monthly repayments, or $1,380 per year to a home loan with a 5.89 per cent interest rate and 25 years remaining.\u201d<\/p>\n
The unanimity in December is notable. <\/p>\n
Before the previous rate cut, a split Board signalled change was coming. <\/p>\n
This time, there was no warning \u2014 another sign of how swiftly the inflation pulse has turned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A shock rebound in inflation has set the stage for the Reserve Bank\u2019s second-fastest policy U\u2011turn on record,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":454782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[64,63,99,164],"class_list":{"0":"post-454781","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-economy"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=454781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/454782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=454781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=454781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=454781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}