The purchasing power and propensity to save of families increased in the third quarter of 2025 and, excluding the Covid period, reached the highest levels since the third quarter of 2009. This is what Istat found, underlining that final consumption spending, however, remains weak.
In detail, families’ disposable income grew by 2% compared to the previous quarter, while consumption grew by 0.3%. The propensity to save is estimated at 11.4%, up 1.5 percentage points compared to the previous quarter. Finally, purchasing power grew compared to the previous quarter by 1.8%.
Declining fiscal pressure
The tax burden was 40%, down 0.8 percentage points compared to the same period of the previous year. The deficit instead stood at 3.4% compared to 2.3% in the same quarter of 2024, while the primary balance (debt net of interest expense) was positive, with an impact on GDP of 0.4% (1.6% in the third quarter of 2024). The current balance was also positive, with an impact on GDP of 1.3% (2.2% in the third quarter of 2024).
Inflation rose to +1.2% in December on an annual basis
In December, according to preliminary estimates, inflation recorded an increase of 0.2% on a monthly basis and accelerated to 1.2% on an annual basis (from +1.1% in the previous month), “returning to the October level”. This was revealed by Istat.
On average in 2025, consumer prices grew by 1.5% compared to the previous year, accelerating compared to the figure recorded in 2024 (+1%). Inflation net of energy and fresh food, i.e. underlying inflation, and inflation net of energy alone show an average annual increase of 1.9% (+2% in the previous year) and 2% (+2.1% in 2024) respectively.