Eurozone inflation hit record high in December

Soaring energy prices forced the Eurozone’s annual inflation rates to its highest ever level last month, the Eurostat agency said Friday.

Officials and economists expect the rate to fall over the year to come, but the record level will add to pressure on the ECB to reconsider its historically low interest rate policy.

The five percent December figure is a first estimate but confirms a trend that has pushed the rate to a quarter-century high, the peak since records began in January 1997.

These figures are well above the European Central Bank’s target of 2.0 percent inflation in the eurozone, but the ECB believes that inflation should fall in 2023, after peaking in 2022.