OREANDA-NEWS. November 13, 2009. The Estonian Finance Ministry said it cannot be ruled out that the country succeeded in meeting the Maastricht inflation criterion in October.

The ministry explained that the reference value by which the country will be judged, calculated on the basis of the inflation rates of the three eurozone countries with the lowest positive inflation, was estimated to have been 1.6-1.8 percent in October.

The ministry also has estimated that rise in the 12-month average harmonized index of consumer prices (HICP) in Estonia slowed down to 1.8 percent.

The reference rate for October depends on which countries make up the lowest reference value group.

In the estimate of the Estonian ministry, chances are that Estonia succeeded in meeting the criterion if Spain and Luxembourg dropped out from the reference group as a result of posting negative inflation for the past 12 months.

Whether or not Estonia met the criterion will become clear when the Eurostat publishes EU inflation statistics on Nov. 16.

The Estonian consumer price index (CPI) decreased 2.2 percent in October 2009 compared to October 2008 and was off 0.1 percent in comparison with September 2009, Statistics Estonia said.

It was the first time that Estonia's CPI decreased by more than 2 percent year on year.