Romania's annual inflation rate highest in EU for sixth straight month

This July Romania registered for the sixth month in a row the highest annual inflation rate in the EU, as consumer prices advanced 4.3 pct, however less than the 4.7 pct inflation rate registered in June, the European Statistical Office (Eurostat) announced on Friday. 

The EU annual inflation rate inched up to 2.2 pct in July from 2.1 pct in June, whereas in the euro area the annual inflation rate was 2.1 pct, up from 2 pct in June. The highest annual rates were registered in Romania (4.3 pct), Bulgaria (3.6 pct) and Hungary (3.4 pct). 

Compared with June 2018, annual inflation fell in nine member states, remained stable in six and rose in thirteen. 

In July 2018, the highest contribution to the annual euro area inflation rate came from energy (+0.89 percentage points), followed by services (+0.64 pp), food, alcohol and tobacco (+0.49 pp) and non-energy industrial goods (+0.12 pp). 

According to data released earlier this month by the National Institute of Statistics (INS), Romania's annual inflation rate dropped in July to 4.56 pct from 5.4 pct in June, as non-foods grew 6.23 pct more expensive YoY, food prices advanced 3.42 pct from the year-ago period, and service prices advanced 2.68 pct. The annual inflation rate measured by the Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices is 4.3 pct. 

The National Bank of Romania revised downwards from 3.6 to 3.5 pct its estimate for the year-end inflation, central bank governor Mugur Isarescu announced recently. For the end of 2019, the central bank estimates an inflation rate of 2.7 percent, down 0.3 pct from the initial projection of 3 percentage points.