BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union’s statistics office Eurostat confirmed on Friday that inflation in the euro zone hit another record high of 9.1 percent in August, driven by a sharp rise in energy and food prices, and is likely to be heading towards double digits.
Consumer price inflation in the 19 countries using the euro rose 0.6% month-on-month and 9.1% year-on-year, the highest rate since the euro was created in 1999.
In its quick estimate at the end of August, Eurostat gave a monthly change figure of 0.5%. The annual figure of 9.1% has not been revised.
Eurostat said 3.95 percentage points of the annual change came from more expensive energy — whose costs rose due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine — and 2.25 points from food, alcohol and tobacco.
But even when excluding volatile energy and unprocessed food – what the European Central Bank calls core inflation – prices were still 5.5% higher than a year earlier, from 5.1% in July.
Industrial goods were 5.1% more expensive than in the previous 12-month period, with prices for services up 3.8%.
The European Central Bank, with a main inflation target of 2%, last week raised key interest rates by an unprecedented 75 basis points and promised more increases, prioritizing fighting inflation even as the bloc heads into a winter recession and gas rationing.
For the Eurostat version, click:
http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/news/news-releases
