31.03.202112:10:00UTC+00Eurozone Inflation Accelerates In March

Eurozone consumer prices accelerated at a faster pace in March driven by a rebound in energy cost, flash data from Eurostat revealed on Wednesday.

Inflation advanced to 1.3 percent in March, in line with expectations, from 0.9 percent in February. This was the third consecutive rise in prices.

Meanwhile, core inflation that excludes energy, food, alcohol & tobacco, eased to 0.9 percent from 1.1 percent in February. Economists had forecast the rate to rise to 1.2 percent.

Inflation is likely to rise above 2 percent in the second half of the year, Jack Allen-Reynolds, an economist at Capital Economics, said. But this is largely due to temporary factors that are likely to fade in 2022 and fall back to 1 percent.

On a monthly basis, the harmonized index of consumer prices was up 0.9 percent. Final data is due on April 16.

Among components of HICP, energy prices showed the biggest annual growth of 4.3 percent. Food, alcohol and tobacco rose 1.1 percent and services cost climbed 1.3 percent. Non-energy industrial goods prices gained only 0.3 percent.

In March, harmonized inflation accelerated in Germany, France and Spain, while it eased in Italy to 0.6 percent from 1.0 percent in February. Germany's inflation advanced to 2 percent from 1.6 percent in February. Likewise, France's inflation climbed to 1.4 percent from 0.8 percent. Spain inflation increased sharply to 1.2 percent from -0.1 percent in February.