Eurozone inflation eases in December, in line with flash estimate

Consumer price inflation in the eurozone eased in December, according to figures released on Wednesday by Eurostat, in line with an earlier flash estimate.

Final inflation was confirmed at 9.2% year-over-year, down from 10.1% in November. This was due mainly to lower energy inflation, with energy prices in the bloc up 25.5% on the year in December, down from 34.9% growth the month before.

Core inflation rose by 0.2 percentage points to 5.2%, in line with the consensus expectations and the initial estimate.

Oxford Economics said: "With core inflation likely to prove sticky, we maintain our ECB call of two further 50 basis points hikes in Q1.

"Beyond that, recent developments, both in terms of favourable inflation data and falling gas prices, support our call that the ECB is likely to pause afterwards."

Separate data also released earlier showed that construction production in the eurozone fell by 0.8% on the month in November, following a revised 1% rise the month before.