Significant drop in inflation to 2.4 per cent

Inflation in the euro zone declined markedly in November according to the statistics office Eurostat in Luxembourg, which stated that consumer prices were down to 2.4 per cent from the level of the previous month (2.9 per cent). A year ago, inflation was still running at 10.1 per cent. In a monthly comparison, prices fell by 0.5 per cent in November.

Core inflation, which excludes the volatile prices for energy and food, also fell significantly. Here the inflation rate declined from 4.2 to 3.6 per cent. Although food, alcohol and tobacco were still considerably more expensive than a year ago, price buoyancy eased from 7.4 to 6.9 per cent. The prices of services and other goods also increased less sharply than in the previous month, while energy prices again fell markedly by 11.5 per cent.