Euro inflation slows further

Euro-area inflation slowed more than economists forecast in May, cranking up pressure on the European Central Bank to deploy measures as soon as this week to kindle prices and drive growth.

The rate fell to 0.5% from 0.7% in April, the European Union’s statistics office in Luxembourg said.

With ECB president Mario Draghi warning about the risk of a negative price spiral, the Governing Council is considering measures from negative interest rates to conditional liquidity for banks. The central bank is also contending with high unemployment, which unexpectedly decreased in April while remaining near a record, a separate Eurostat report showed.