Venezuela November inflation fastest in 4-1/2 years

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan consumer prices rose at their fastest rate in more than four years last month as President Hugo Chavez spent lavishly on social programs in a referendum that would have increased his power.

The November jump of 4.4 percent in the consumer price index was nearly double the 2.4 percent CPI rise in October, the central bank said on Monday.

The increase was also far higher than economists were expecting. In a Reuters survey of eight financial institutions taken last week, the average estimate for the month was a rise of 2.6 percent.

Inflation in the 12 months to the end of November reached 20.7 percent, the highest rate in Latin America and a worrying sign for Wall Street of an overheating economy as well as a political challenge for leftist President Hugo Chavez.

The last time consumer prices rose higher than November's figure was in February 2003. Inflation then -- when a national strike had sparked an economic crisis -- was 5.5 percent.

Last year, November's inflation was 1.3 percent.

Earlier on Monday, a senior government official told Reuters the figure would be higher than 4 percent.

Chavez lost the referendum to expand his constitutional powers in a vote on Sunday.

Election officials said on Monday that the "No" camp rejecting the referendum garnered about 51 percent of the vote against the reform package and the anti-U.S. president scored around 49 percent support.

(Reporting by Ana Isabel Martinez and Deisy Buitrago; Writing by Saul Hudson)