PARIS: France's inflation rate eased slightly in February, when cheaper clothes partly offset surging energy costs, data showed on Tuesday, giving euro zone central bankers cause to think twice about raising interest rates.
Annual inflation eased to 1.8 percent, the data from statistics office INSEE showed, suggesting the risk of a recent acceleration in prices becoming more entrenched has yet to materialise in the euro zone's second largest economy. Inflation based on EU-harmonised methods of measurement was 1.8 percent, compared to 1.9 percent in January and to an average forecast of 1.9 percent by economists polled in advance by Reuters.
The month-on-month price rise for February was 0.5 percent in EU-harmonised terms.
"Inflation worry is widespread but it (the rate) remains at the low-tide mark in France," said Alexander law, an economist at Xerfi, a business consultancy.
"February price developments offer no justification for preventive rise in (ECB) interest rates.
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