At the beginning of the year, the consensus market opinion was that the major central banks were set to begin their interest rate-cutting cycles in March. This reflected a persistent decline in headline and core inflation rates during 2023. Indeed, inflation rates peaked in the summer of 2022, and since then they have shown a steep decline in most economies. Citigroup’s global inflation surprise index best illustrates this trend – it shows a significant decline since 2022. Eurozone inflation  This trend was particularly evident in the eurozone, where headline inflation rates are nearly at or close to the ECB’s 2…