According to the report from Eurostat, the euro area annual inflation rate was 0.7% in March 2020, down from 1.2% in February. A year earlier, the rate was 1.4%. European Union annual inflation was 1.2% in March 2020, down from 1.6% in February. A year earlier, the rate was 1.6%.

The lowest annual rates were registered in Spain, Italy, Cyprus and Portugal (all 0.1%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Hungary, Poland (both 3.9%) and Czechia (3.6%). Compared with February, annual inflation fell in twenty-six Member States and rose in one.

In March, the highest contribution to the annual euro area inflation rate came from services (+0.60 percentage points, pp), followed by food, alcohol & tobacco (+0.46 pp), non-energy industrial goods (+0.13 pp) and energy (-0.45 pp).