What is in the Australia CPI report
The ABS prices a basket of goods and services that households buy, from food and rents to fuel, insurance and holidays. The headline is the rise in the whole index over twelve months. The report also gives the change on the month, seasonally adjusted.
The release of 26 November 2025, for October, made the monthly CPI Australia's main measure of headline inflation. It replaced the Monthly CPI Indicator, which ran from 2022 and ended with the September 2025 figures. The new index has monthly prices for 87% of the basket by weight, against about half for the old indicator.
Quarterly figures still exist for contracts and indexation. The ABS calculates them as the average of the three monthly indexes and adds them to every third monthly report.
Why Australia CPI moves the Australian dollar
The RBA aims for inflation between 2 and 3%, in the middle of that band. A figure above the forecast makes a higher cash rate, or a later cut, more likely. Australian yields rise and the Aussie usually follows. A figure below the forecast does the opposite.
The RBA leans on underlying inflation more than on the headline. The trimmed mean is the average of the middle 70% of price changes, so the biggest rises and falls at both ends drop out. A jump in petrol or a rebate on power bills weighs much less in it.
When the complete monthly index started, the RBA said it would keep its focus on trimmed mean inflation from the quarterly CPI during the transition. That gives extra weight to the reports that complete a quarter.
How to read Australia CPI against the forecast
The market has priced the forecast before 11:30. What moves the Aussie is the distance between the figure and that forecast, on trimmed mean first and on the headline second.
A headline pushed up by fuel or electricity tends to fade, because the RBA looks through one-off price swings. A trimmed mean above the forecast tends to last, because it says the rise is spread across the basket.
The RBA itself has warned that monthly figures can be volatile, even over twelve months. One hot month moves the price on the day. Two or three in a row change what the market expects from the next RBA meetings.
What the Australian dollar did on the last release days
Measured on our own prices: the Australian dollar against the basket of the eight majors, from the London opening before the release to the one after it, so the release sits inside the window. Anything else that came out between those two openings is in it too, so a day with more news says less about this release alone.
| Release | Amsterdam | Measured | AUD vs basket |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 Sept 2026 | 03:30 | 29 Sept to 30 Sept | -0.25% |
For scale: on an ordinary day the Australian dollar moves 0.22% against the basket from one London opening to the next, either way, on average over the 250 trading days since 14 Oct 2025.
The forecast, the figure itself and what it changed in our view of the currency are in the app, next to the research.