The inflation rate was decreased due to prices being lowered for convenience products and tariffs for natural gas. Since the beginning of the year, it decreased from 3.7% to 3.3%. Still, according to the forecast of NBM, the inflation rate next year will be around 5%.

"Despite prices for food lowering by 0.2%, the regulated prices recorded a deviation of -2.2%, due to the decrease of natural gas tariff, while the fuel prices register a deviation of 0.9%" deputy governor of NBM, Vladimir Munteanu declared.

Representatives of the Central Bank explained why MDL has been recently rising. This tendency might continue if EU will weaken, or the commercial war between China and USA will be accentuated. 

"It is normal for this to happen, as in the past few weeks the Euro decreased by nearly 4%. This is determined by macro-economic factors and the macro-economic tendencies in the Euro zone, USA and other countries" Vladimir Munteanu explained.

According to the Central Bank, the number of Moldovans taking loans in lei slightly increased. The number of loans in the first trimester of the year having risen by 1.8% compared to a similar period from 2017, while the interest rates decreased by 9.5%.