China Inflation Takes Off After Holiday Boost as Oil Shock Looms

Bloomberg · last updated March 8, 2026 – 10:53 PM

China’s consumer-price growth accelerated to the quickest in over three years and factory deflation moderated again, after a rally in energy markets and as household spending boomed during a later-than-usual Lunar New Year holiday.

The consumer-price index climbed faster than all forecasts in February and reached 1.3% from a year earlier, after a 0.2% rise in January, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics on Monday. The median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg was 0.9%.

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