BRUSSELS (BNO NEWS) -- The European Union (EU) on Monday announced that annual inflation in the 17-country euro area was 2.3 percent in January, up .1 percent compared to last December's 2.2 percent, but less than expected.

The figures released by the EU's statistical office, Eurostat, showed the highest in over two years. Meanwhile, the EU's annual inflation in January remained steady at 2.7 percent, compared to December.

Inflation was lower than experts had anticipated, but the number is still higher than the European Central Bank's target of 2 percent.

Compared with last December, annual inflation rose in fifteen and fell in twelve Member States.

The lowest annual rates in January were observed in Ireland (0.2 percent) and Sweden (1.4 percent), and the highest in Romania (7.0 percent), Estonia (5.1 percent) and Greece (4.9 percent).

Furthermore, the lowest 12-month averages up to January were registered in Ireland (-1.4 percent), Latvia (-0.7 percent) and Slovakia (1.0 percent) and the highest in Romania (6.2 percent), Greece (4.9 percent) and Hungary (4.5 percent).

The report also revealed that the main components with the highest annual rates in January were transport (5.1 percent), housing (4.5 percent) and alcohol & tobacco (3.7 percent), while the lowest annual rates were observed for clothing (-0.6 percent), communications
(-0.2 percent) and recreation & culture (0.1 percent).

Concerning the detailed sub-indices, fuels for transport (+0.58 percentage points), heating oil (+0.19) and electricity (+0.11) had the largest upward impacts on the headline rate, while garments (-0.14), telecommunications (-0.08) and rents (-0.07) had the biggest downward impacts.

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