According to Yahoo News, Bank Indonesia (BI) is predicted to keep its key policy rate unchanged at 6.00% on Thursday and likely maintain it at that level until at least mid-2024, based on a Reuters poll of economists. A few respondents still anticipated another rate hike. Despite inflation rising to 2.56% in October from 2.28% in September, it remained within the central bank's 2%-4% target range for the year, indicating that price pressures were less of a concern in Southeast Asia's largest economy.
Bank Indonesia's unexpected 25-basis-point rate hike on October 19 was aimed at supporting the rupiah, which had fallen around 8% against the dollar since May. The currency has since gained nearly 2% against the greenback and was trading around 15,540/$ on Monday. Expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve was done with hiking rates also boosted the rupiah and other Asian currencies.
In a November 14-20 Reuters poll, a strong majority of economists, 27 of 31, expected Indonesia's central bank to keep its benchmark key interest rate unchanged at 6.00% on Thursday. The remaining four predicted a quarter-percentage-point hike to 6.25%. Despite median forecasts showing no change to interest rates at least until the end of the second quarter of 2024, there was a plurality of views among economists on the key rate.