Eurozone inflation dips to 5-month low in May

The inflation across 19-country Eurozone was expected to plunge from April's 1.9 percent to five-month low at 1.4 percent in May, official data showed Wednesday, piling pressure on the bloc's policy makers who have struggled to raise prices via massive stimulus measures.

The decline was largely due to the deceleration in energy price hiking, which has helped boost inflation in recent months, according to the EU statistics agency Eurostat.

The core inflation, excluding volatile elements such as energy and food, remained subdued at 0.9 percent, lower than the 1.2 percent of the previous month.

May's reading may worry the European Central Bank which carried out massive asset purchasing program and sought to push the bloc's inflation to a goal of close to 2 percent.

Economists, however, held a positive view of further inflation, saying that many indicators signified that underlying inflation was expected to increase in the coming months.

The economy is growing at a decent pace, and recent activity surveys suggested that the recovery will strengthen, said a research of the Capital Economics, adding that the bloc's labor market has continued to tighten.

In a separate report, the Eurostat said Eurozone's unemployment rate fell from a downwardly-revised 9.4 percent in March to 9.3 percent in April, marking the lowest rate since March 2009.

(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)