Spain Prices Drop Most Since 2009 as Oil Bedevils ECB Debate

Spanish consumer prices fell the most since July 2009 in a sign that slumping oil costs are complicating the European Central Bank’s battle to stave off deflation in the euro area.

Prices slid 1.1 percent this month from a year earlier, the Madrid-based National Statistics Institute said today. The drop was the sixth in a row and bigger than the 0.7 percent forecast by economists in a Bloomberg News survey. Euro-area data next week is forecast to show consumer prices in the currency bloc stagnated in December.