The European markets lost their profits

European stock markets have lost ground and continue to decline as the latest data from Germany rekindled inflation concerns despite new assurances from the president of the European Central Bank today that upward pressures will ease over time.

Christine Lagarde reiterated today that inflation, according to the bank’s forecasts, will gradually decline over the year as energy prices and supply chain disruptions are expected to decline.

Speaking to France Inter radio, the ECB president noted that the central bank does not need to act as boldly as the US Federal Reserve, due to the different economic situation. “The cycle of economic recovery in the United States is ahead of that in Europe. So we have every reason not to act as quickly and violently as one might imagine the Fed would do,” he said.

“But we have started to react and we are obviously ready to react with monetary policy measures if the facts, the data, the facts, demand it,” he stressed.

However, data released today by Germany showed a new record rise in producer prices, bringing inflation concerns back to the forefront.

In particular, producer prices in Germany recorded an annual jump of 24.2% in December, continuing the rally of previous months. This is the largest annual increase since records began in 1949, the statistics office said. At the same time, it exceeded the average estimates of analysts who spoke of an annual increase of 19.4%.

The December jump follows a rally in prices over the past two months, with the statistical service announcing an increase of 18.4% for October and 19.2% for November.

On the board, the pan-European Stoxx 600 is down 0.4% at 479.10 points.

The German DAX lost 0.4% to 15,755.60 points, the French CAC-40 fell 0.6% to 7,132.72 points, while the British FTSE 100 fell 0.3% to 7,567.77 points.

In the periphery, the Italian FTSE MIB recorded marginal losses of 0.04%, while the Spanish IBEX-35 lost 0.3%.