Eurozone inflation stabilised in February but did not fall as expected.<br /><br />Consumer prices in the 18 countries sharing the euro was up by 0.8 percent from February last year. <br /><br />That is the same rate as in January and December, after readings of 0.9 percent in November and 0.7 percent in October.<br /><br />Under one percent keeps it in what the European Central Bank calls the “danger zone”.<br /><br />But February’s trend makes it less likely ECB policymakers will cut interest rates further at their monthly meeting next week.<br /><br />In addition, so-called core inflation in the eurozone, which excludes the most volatile components like energy, food, alcohol and tobacco prices, continued to inch higher.<br /><br />Price pressures in the euro zone are low because unemployment remains stuck near record highs. <br /><br />As the inflation figures were released by the European Union statistics office Eurostat, it also said that 12 percent of the bloc’s workforce was unemployed in January, unchanged from a month before.<br /><br />In absolute terms, the number of people without jobs edged higher to 19,175,000 from 19,158,000 in December, it said.
