The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is in a race against time to get inflation back under control. Economists at Commerzbank expect further rate hikes throughout the rest of 2022 but the bias for USD/INR is still to the upside. 

RBI to continue to hike for the rest of the year 

“We look for 50bp and 25bp hike in June and August respectively from 4.40% currently. This will take the benchmark repo rate back to the pre-pandemic level of 5.15%. After that, we could yet see another 50bp hike in the remaining two meetings for the year, in September and December.”

“The policy direction for RBI is unambiguous. It is to anchor inflationary expectations. We could see RBI raise its inflation forecast once again at the next meeting from 5.7% currently for the current fiscal year 2022-2023.” 

“In terms of implications for INR, the rate hikes should provide some support. Nevertheless, the bias for USD/INR is still to the upside, but we suspect RBI will be keen to mitigate INR’s weakness in order to contain import prices and not exacerbate the inflation picture.”