Worldwide Inflation Rates

Interpretation

The charts above display the historical inflation rates for various countries, as measured by the yearly change in the Consumer Price Index (CPI). High inflation indicates rising prices for goods and services, diminishing the purchasing power of the currency and potentially decreasing its value on the foreign exchange market. Conversely, deflation occurs when prices drop, enhancing the currency's purchasing power. While deflation might seem beneficial in the short term, it can lead to reduced consumer spending as people delay purchases, anticipating lower prices. This behavior can result in decreased business revenue, layoffs, and ultimately, slower economic growth.
The CPI tracks the price of a basket of diverse goods and services such as housing, food, transportation, and healthcare, and serves as a key indicator of price levels in an economy. In the United States, the CPI is calculated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Central banks, such as the Federal Reserve, manage inflation by regulating the money supply, using tools like interest rate adjustments and quantitative easing. Lowering interest rates and implementing quantitative easing can stimulate economic activity by making borrowing cheaper and credit more abundant, useful for addressing low inflation or deflation.
Conversely, by raising interest rates and shrinking its balance sheet, the Fed can cool down an overheated economy. This approach raises the cost of borrowing and reduces the amount of currency in circulation, helping to keep inflation in check.

Further Information

• Investopedia: Consumer Price Index (CPI): What It Is and How It's Used
• US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Consumer Price Index Frequently Asked Questions
• Youtube: Milton Friedman Speaks: Money and Inflation

Interpretation

This heatmap shows how inflation rates in different countries move in relation to each other. Red squares indicate a positive correlation (inflation rates rising or falling together), while blue shows a negative correlation. Notice how inflation often clusters regionally, as neighboring countries can be exposed to similar supply chain pressures and economic shocks.

For economists and policymakers, understanding these relationships is crucial for anticipating global economic trends. For investors, it provides context on how inflation in one region might impact currency values and asset prices elsewhere. This highlights the interconnectedness of global economies, a concept central to Ray Dalio's macroeconomic analysis.

To create this chart, monthly log-changes in inflation rates are calculated, and the Pearson correlation is computed for every pair of countries. The heatmap is then organized using hierarchical clustering to group countries with the most similar inflation patterns, making it easier to spot macroeconomic trends.

Interpretation

The Minimum Spanning Tree (MST) simplifies the correlation matrix by showing only the strongest connections between countries' inflation rates. If two inflation rates are linked, they have a strong positive correlation and tend to move in tandem. This helps identify clusters of related assets and is useful for understanding global economic structures.
The tree is constructed by converting the correlations into distances and then finding the set of connections that links all countries' inflation rates with the minimum total distance. As noted by Marti, Gautier, et al. (2017), the tree tends to 'shrink' during a financial crisis as correlations rise across the board.