The European Commission today welcomed a report showing euro zone inflation subsided to a two-and-a-half-year low in June and said it hoped for more benign inflation data in the coming months.
Euro zone consumer prices rose 1.7 per cent in June compared with a year earlier, their slowest pace since December 1999, according to an early estimate released today by the European Union statistics office.
It was the first time since May 2000 that inflation has come in below the European Central Bank's self-imposed two percent ceiling and it will be welcome news for the bank before its July 4 policy meeting at which rates are expected to be left unchanged.
The decline in the inflation rate had been flagged by national consumer price reports which had already been released but was lower than the 1.9 percent rate which economists had expected.
Earlier today, Italy reported its inflation rate had fallen to a 30-month low while earlier this week data out of Germany had shown inflation in the euro zone's largest economy is running at its slowest pace since November 1999.
Belgian consumer price data had also been subdued.
Still, economists have warned the annual rate at which consumer prices are rising may rebound in the coming months as inflation was being flattered because of statistical effects linked to the spike in food and oil prices last year.