According to the lastest data published by the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat), the annual inflation rate for the Euro zone remained stable during the month of July with a value of 4%. The same indicator for the whole EU zone showed an increase of 0.1% as against 4.3% in June.

In July 2008, the lowest annual rates were observed in the Netherlands (3.0%), Portugal (3.1%) and Germany (3.5%), and the highest in Latvia (16.5%), Bulgaria (14.4%) and Lithuania (12.4%). Compared with June 2008, annual inflation rose in fifteen Member States, remained stable in five and fell in seven.

The lowest 12-month averages up to July 2008 were registered in the Netherlands (1.8%), the United Kingdom (2.6%) and Portugal (2.7%), and the highest in Latvia (15.1%), Bulgaria (12.3%) and Estonia (10.1%).

According to the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat), and always in the Euro zone the components with the highest annual rates in July 2008 were transport (7.2%), food and housing (both 6.7%), while the lowest annual rates were observed for communications (-2.2%), clothing (-0.5%) and recreation & culture (0.2%). Concerning the detailed sub-indices, fuels for transport (+0.71 percentage points), heating oil (+0.39) and milk, cheese & eggs (+0.20) had the largest upward impacts on the headline rate, while garments (-0.24), telecommunications (-0.20) and cars (-0.19) had the biggest downward impacts.

In terms of monthly rates, the highest rates were reached by recreation & culture and hotels & restaurants (both 1.3%) as well as housing (0.8%). On the contrary, the lowest were clothing (-9.3%), household equipment (-0.4%) and communications (-0.3%). In particular, package holidays (+0.15 percentage points), accommodation services (+0.11) and fuels for transport (+0.05) had the largest upward impacts, while garments (-0.50) and footwear (-0.13) had the biggest downward impacts.