Eurozone inflation data released this morning showed a surprisingly large jump in services inflation, which economists said may have been partly due to Taylor Swift.
Package holidays and accommodation services inflation both rose quite sharply in Spain and Portugal where Swift performed on her 'Eras Tour'.
A similar impact was felt last year in Sweden at the time of a Beyoncé concert, so this latest spike shouldn't affect the European Central Bank's next policy decision, said economist Jack Allen-Reynolds at Capital Economics.
"The ECB can 'shake it off'," he said.
May’s flash release showed a bigger-than-anticipated jump in services inflation, taking it to a seven-month high of 4.1% y/y. The final release of the May data, published this morning, showed that transport services inflation increased, as we had expected, reflecting base effects from the introduction of cheap public transport tickets in Germany in May last year.
"France also hosted four dates on the Eras tour in May, but the effect there seems to have been smaller, perhaps because the economy is bigger so a small number of concerts has less of an impact on the average level of prices," Allen-Reynolds noted.
"Germany, which will not be lucky/unfortunate (delete as appropriate) enough to host Ms Swift until July, saw no rise in accommodation services inflation at all."
More of a concern for the ECB will be that wage-sensitive inflation remained strong at 4.4% in May, though timelier data on pay growth "suggests that it will decline in the coming quarters", the Swift-appreciating economist said.