According to Eurostat, the statistical office of the EU, Euro area annual inflation was 0.7% in February 2014, down from 0.8% in January. A year earlier the rate was 1.8%. Monthly inflation was 0.3% in February 2014. European Union annual inflation was 0.8% in February 2014, down from 0.9% in January. A year earlier the rate was 2.0%. Monthly inflation was 0.3% in February 2014.

In February 2014, negative annual rates were observed in Bulgaria (-2.1%), Cyprus (-1.3%), Greece (-0.9%), Croatia (-0.2%), Portugal and Slovakia (both -0.1%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Malta and Finland (both 1.6%) and Austria (1.5%). Compared with January 2014, annual inflation fell in seventeen Member States, remained stable in three and rose in seven. The lowest 12 month average rates up to February 2014 were registered in Greece (-1.1%), Bulgaria (-0.3%) and Cyprus (-0.2%), and the highest in Estonia (2.8%), Romania (2.6%), the Netherlands and Finland (both 2.1%).

The largest upward impacts to euro area annual inflation came from tobacco (+0.08 percentage points), restaurants & cafés and electricity (+0.06 each), while fuels for transport (-0.30), telecommunications (-0.10) and heating oil (-0.07) had the biggest downward impacts.

Source: Famagusta Gazette