According to the report from Eurostat, the euro area annual inflation rate was 1.4% in March 2019, down from 1.5% in February 2019. A year earlier, the rate was 1.4%. European Union annual inflation was 1.6% in March 2019, stable compared to February 2019. A year earlier, the rate was 1.6%.

The lowest annual rates were registered in Portugal (0.8%) and Greece (1.0%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Romania (4.2%), Hungary (3.8%) and the Netherlands (2.9%). Compared with February 2019, annual inflation fell in six Member States, remained stable in two and rose in nineteen.

In March 2019, the highest contribution to the annual euro area inflation rate came from energy (+0.52 percentage points, pp), followed by services (+0.51 pp), food, alcohol & tobacco (+0.34 pp) and non-energy industrial goods (+0.04 pp).