Investing.com - Consumer price inflation in the euro zone fell into negative territory for the first time in five months in February, adding to pressure on the European Central Bank to step up measures to boost price growth in the euro area, official preliminary data showed on Monday.
In a report, Eurostat said consumer price inflation fell by a seasonally adjusted 0.2% this month, missing expectations for a gain of 0.1% and following a 0.3% increase in January.
Core CPI, which excludes food, energy, alcohol, and tobacco costs increased by a seasonally adjusted 0.7% in February, below forecasts for 0.9% and down from 1.0% a month earlier.
European Central Bank Mario Draghi signaled recently that fresh easing measures could be rolled out as soon as the bank’s next meeting on March 10 in response to sluggish inflation and a weakening global economy.
EUR/USD was trading at 1.0904 from around 1.0915 ahead of the release of the data, while EUR/GBP was at 0.7867 from 0.7871 earlier.
Meanwhile, European stock markets were broadly lower. The EURO STOXX 50 tumbled 1.6%, Germany's DAX fell 1.7%, France’s CAC 40 lost 1.3%, while London’s FTSE 100 shed 0.9%.