It negatively affected the eurozone bond markets, including the Greek, the unexpected rise in inflation in two of the eurozone’s biggest economies, France and Spain, raising concerns about whether Thursday’s eurozone-wide data will confirm the forecast for inflation to ease to 8.2% from 8, 6%.

In any case, however, the markets expect the ECB to move on March 16 to one another 0.5% interest rate hikewhile they are already estimating that by the end of the year the basic deposit rate will reach 4% from the current 2.5%.

Nevertheless, the ECB’s chief economist Philip Lane today appeared optimistic about the path of inflation, pointing out that pressures on eurozone inflation have begun to ease.

In the secondary market, in the Electronic Transaction System (HDAT) the volume of transactions was 110 million euros, of which 46 million euros related to purchase orders. The benchmark 10-year bond yield rose to 4.47% from 4.31% on Friday, against 2.67% of the corresponding German bond, resulting in the spread to 1.8% from 1.78% that closed at the end of the previous week.

In the foreign exchange market, the euro is moving higher against the dollar today as the European currency traded at $1.0611 in the early afternoon from the level of $1.0607 that opened the market.

The indicative euro / dollar exchange rate announced by the ECB was 1.0619 dollars