Documentation
The documentation summarises the characteristics of the Consumer Prices data set and provides country-specific information on the underlying indicators, sources and length of the series.
About
The consumer price index data set contains long series that track the overall change in the prices of goods and services purchased by households. Consumer price indices are a key macroeconomic indicator, for instance to measure inflation and assess purchasing power over time.
The data set includes monthly and annual time series for more than 60 countries. Some annual series go back to the mid-19th century, or earlier for a few countries. The average length of the monthly series is more than 60 years. The BIS has constructed long consumer price indices, by joining the series available for consecutive periods.
Consumer price indices are commonly used as a deflator for other economic series. The series have been used, in particular, for the calculation of the real effective exchange rate and real residential property price series published by the BIS.