Euro zone consumer prices rose slightly in June, while core measures of inflation which exclude volatile components eased, the European Union statistics office Eurostat said on Friday, confirming its earlier estimates.
In a report by Reuters on Friday, Eurostat said annual inflation in the 19 countries sharing the euro rose by 0.3 per cent in June after a rise of just 0.1 per cent in May, in line with the agency’s earlier estimates released on June 30.
Despite the uptick, inflation is still far below the European Central Bank’s target of below but close to 2 per cent over the medium term.
Food, alcohol and tobacco prices went up in annual terms by 3.2 per cent, while prices in the services sector, the largest in the bloc’s economy, rose by 1.2 per cent in June. These increases offset a 9.3 per cent fall in energy prices.
Excluding energy and unprocessed food prices – a measure the ECB calls core inflation and watches closely in policy decisions – prices grew 1.1 per cent in annual terms, easing from 1.2 per cent in May, Eurostat figures showed.
An even narrower core inflation measure, stripping out also alcohol and tobacco prices that many market economists look at, dipped to 0.8 per cent year-on-year from 0.9 per cent in May.
Both measures of core inflation confirmed Eurostat’s earlier estimates.
Month-on-month, euro zone inflation also rose 0.3 per cent in June.