Also at the European level: inflation in the euro area falls to 10.0 percent

Inflation in the euro area was 10.0 percent in November.

This was announced by the European statistical office Eurostat on Wednesday based on an initial estimate.

In October, the inflation rate was still 10.6 percent.

Christian Siedenbiedel

Editor in Business.

• Follow I follow

As in Germany, the consequences of the lower oil price are also being felt in the euro area as a whole.

Although energy prices are still significantly higher than a year ago, there was a fall in November compared to October.

In some euro countries, political interventions have also artificially depressed inflation.

Food prices, on the other hand, have continued to rise month by month.

There is currently a debate among economists as to whether inflation has already peaked.

This could be supported by the fact that oil prices will not rise as they did in the past post-pandemic phase in the near future.

However, the further development of energy prices is very uncertain overall.

Many companies also want to pass on the higher prices they incur themselves to their customers in the coming months.

However, the economic downturn could make it increasingly difficult for them to push through higher prices.

Sharp drop in inflation in the Netherlands

Depending on the euro country, the development is very different.

The Netherlands recorded a sharp drop in inflation.

Here, however, inflation had also been extraordinarily high in the past few months compared to other euro countries.

Now in November, the inflation rate has fallen from 16.8 to 11.2 percent.

In France, which has recently had the lowest inflation rate among all euro countries due to political interventions, the inflation rate remained at 7.1 percent in November, as the French statistics office Insee announced on Wednesday.

Analysts had expected a slight decline to 7 percent.

Inflation in Spain surprisingly fell to 6.8 percent in November, down from 7.3 percent in October.

In Austria, on the other hand, the inflation rate even rose slightly, by 0.1 percentage points to 11.1 percent.

According to Statistics Austria boss Tobias Thomas, the rise in prices for the most important inflation drivers, household energy and fuels, has also recently weakened somewhat in Austria.

According to the national method of calculating the consumer price index (CPI), the inflation rate in Germany fell from 10.4 to 10.0 percent.

According to the European calculation method of the Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices (HICP), which is used for comparison with other countries and is also decisive for European monetary policy, German inflation was 11.3 percent in November and thus above the European average.

The figures from the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, which have already been published in more detail, provide clues as to which goods and services have become cheaper or more expensive.

The development of energy prices is particularly striking there.

A high increase of 43.5 percent was recorded here compared to the same month last year.

However, compared to the previous month of October, prices in November were lower, with a drop of 2.7 percent.

Accordingly, the price increase compared to the same month of the previous year was no longer as strong as in October.

Heating oil has fallen sharply in price

This development of somewhat cheaper energy was particularly noticeable in the case of heating oil.

Here, prices in November fell by 9.8 percent compared to October.

Compared to the previous month, diesel prices fell by 7.8 percent, petrol by 4.4 percent - for fuel by 5.3 percent in total.

A remarkable change;

nonetheless, all of these prices are still significantly higher than a year ago.

Food prices, on the other hand, continued to rise on average.

Compared to the previous month, the price increase was 0.9 percent, compared to the same month last year it was 21 percent.

Fruit and vegetables were slightly cheaper in November than in October, while dairy products and eggs were even more expensive.

Compared to the same month last year, there were particularly drastic price increases for edible oils and fats at plus 41.9 percent, for dairy products and eggs at plus 34.8 percent and for bread and cereal products at plus 22.4 percent.

The prices for services in NRW fell by 1.2 percent compared to the previous month.

This is remarkable, even if it still means an increase compared to the same month last year.

Compared to the previous month, there was a sharp seasonal decline in the prices for package tours, where there was a minus of 25.3 percent.

The European Central Bank is discussing how much the central bank should raise interest rates in December.

ECB President Christine Lagarde had so far left no doubt that there should be another interest rate hike.

However, she had always emphasized that further action would be decided from meeting to meeting based on the data situation.

The next meeting of the Governing Council is on December 15th.

In a recent survey, the majority of economists expected interest rates to rise by 0.5 percentage points.

Commerzbank, which had long expected interest rates to rise by 0.75 percentage points, revised its interest rate forecast downwards this week.

Addressing the European Parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee on Monday, the ECB President stressed that she would not yet say that inflation in the euro area had already peaked.

She also warned that markets should be cautious about the fall in gas prices.

The European statistical office Eurostat intends to publish the first estimate of inflation in the euro area for November on Wednesday.

In October, euro inflation was 10.6 percent.