The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) maintained on Thursday that average inflation in 2009 would come in around 3.4 percent, although it said downside risks continued to dominate.

It however cut its estimate of average inflation in 2010 to 3.7 percent from 4.1 percent.

The monetary authority made the comments in a statement after cutting key policy rates by 25 basis points, bringing cumulative interest rate cuts to 1.75 percentage points since December.