Consumers still wary over euro price hikes

Three days to go until the euro is introduced but the prospect is making a lot of Europeans extremely uneasy. Nearly one in three Europeans think shopkeepers will find a way to cheat them when euro notes and coins begin circulating on Jan. 1, according to a poll commissioned by The Wall Street Journal Europe. Fifty-two percent of those polled say they'd prefer to keep using their old currency, if they could. The figures come from a poll commissioned by the newspaper and conducted by GfK Ad Hoc Research Worldwide of Brussels. European governments have spent 321 million euros promoting the new currency, but the poll indicates that many people still fear the changeover and worry that they'll be harmed somehow. One in four still believe the currency will be bad for them, while only one in 10 say they'll be better off. “It's very disappointing,” said Xavier Durieu, secretary general of Eurocommerce, a trade association representing retailers and wholesalers in 24 countries. “They're showing their fear of the unknown.”