According to the report from Eurostat, the euro area annual inflation rate was 1.2% in May 2019, down from 1.7% in April 2019. A year earlier, the rate was 2.0%. European Union annual inflation was 1.6% in May 2019, down from 1.9% in April 2019. A year earlier, the rate was 2.0%.

The lowest annual rates were registered in Cyprus (0.2%), Portugal (0.3%) and Greece (0.6%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Romania (4.4%), Hungary (4.0%) and Latvia (3.5%). Compared with April 2019, annual inflation fell in sixteen Member States, remained stable in five and rose in six.

In May 2019, the highest contribution to the annual euro area inflation rate came from services (+0.47 percentage points, pp), followed by energy (+0.38 pp), food, alcohol & tobacco (+0.29 pp) and non-energy industrial goods (+0.08 pp).