Germany PPI Inflation At Record High

Germany's producer price inflation accelerated unexpectedly to a new record high in July, primarily driven by higher energy costs, data from Destatis showed on Friday.

Producer prices grew 37.2 percent year-over-year in July, well above the 32.7 percent surge in June. Economists had forecast inflation to ease slightly to 32.0 percent.

Further, this was the highest annual increase since the survey began in 1949, Destatis said.

The upward trend in July was largely caused by a 105.0 percent jump in energy prices amid soaring natural gas and electricity costs.

Excluding energy, producer prices were 14.6 percent higher in July compared to last year.

Among other components of the producer price index, prices of intermediate goods increased 19.1 percent and those for capital goods grew 8.3 percent.

Prices for durable consumer goods climbed 10.9 percent, and non-durable consumer goods also registered a double-digit growth of 16.2 percent.

On a monthly basis, producer prices increased at a faster rate of 5.3 percent in July, after a 0.6 percent gain in the previous month. Prices were expected to increase at a steady pace of 0.6 percent.