Portuguese 12-month inflation rate slowed down slightly to 1.4% in December, down from 1.5% a month earlier, as food prices fell, flash data from the National Statistics Institute (INE) showed on Friday.

Core inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy prices and is seen as a better gauge of the underlying trend, was at 2.6% year-on-year, down from 2.9% in November.

Still, the 2023 annual average inflation rate was 4.3%, after 7.8% in 2022.

Inflation has been steadily coming down after peaking at 10.1% year-on-year in October 2022.

On a monthly basis, consumer prices fell 0.5% in December. (Reporting by Patrícia Vicente Rua and Gdansk Newsroom; Editing by Inti Landauro)