Norway, UK central banks hike rates in August
Brazil reinforces Latam cycle has turned with rate cut
Currency weakness, inflation woes force Turkey, Russia hikes

LONDON, Sept 4 Reuters Central banks across major developed and emerging economies took a breather in August with the pace and scale of interest rate hikes shifting another gear lower as diverging growth outlooks and inflation risks muddied the outlook ahead.

August often a more quiet month for monetary policy decisions saw only four of the central banks overseeing the 10 most heavily traded currencies hold rate setting meetings. Two of them  Norway and United Kingdom  delivered a total of 50 basis points of rate hikes in the lowest such tally since January. Australia and New Zealand kept their benchmarks unchanged, Reuters data showed.

The moves compare to three hikes across six meetings in July, and takes the total 2023 yeartodate tally for G10 central banks to a total of 1,075 bps across 33 hikes.

But the outlook ahead was murky, with surprisingly resilient U.S. data contrasting with disappointing numbers from China and much of Europe and markets searching for clues when major central banks could embark on easing rates.

This downbeat growth story does have an upbeat consequence; inflationary pressure should ease further, said ING39;s global head of macroeconomics Carsten Brzeski. He added that while this was likely not enough to bring inflation back to target for many central banks, it should be low…