The U.S. Labor Department reported Wednesday that the Producer Price Index (PPI), which measures inflation at the wholesale level before it reaches consumers, surged 11.2% in March from the year-ago period. On a monthly basis, prices grew by 1.4% – an uptick from February, when the gauge increased by 0.9%.
Economists surveyed by Refinitiv expected producer inflation to rise by 10.6% on an annual basis and 1.1% from the previous month.
The prices that goods and services producers receive rose in March at the fastest pace since records have been kept, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Wednesday.
PPI is considered a forward-looking inflation measure as it tracks prices in the pipeline for goods and services that eventually reach consumers.
Wednesday’s release comes the day after the BLS reported that the consumer price index for March surged 8.5% over the past year, above expectations and the highest reading since December 1981.
Swelling inflation has prompted the Federal Reserve to begin tightening monetary policy.
In March, the Fed increased its benchmark short-term borrowing rate by 0.25 percentage points as the first step in what is expected to be a series of hikes through the year. Markets are pricing in an almost certainty that the central bank will double that move at its May meeting, and will keep going until the fed funds rate hits about 2.5% by the end of the year.
MacDailyNews Take: The beatings will continue until morale improves.
‘Tis best to get a handle on inflation, if you know how, while you still can. – MacDailyNews, May 11, 2021
Earlier this year, Interactive Brokers founder Thomas Peterffy said, “Inflation is 7% — 1% or 2% [in interest rate hikes] doesn’t mean anything. If they really wanted to stop inflation, they would have to raise rates to 4%, 5%, 6%.”
Inflation is repudiation. — Calvin Coolidge
When a business or an individual spends more than it makes, it goes bankrupt. When government does it, it sends you the bill. And when government does it for 40 years, the bill comes in two ways: higher taxes and inflation. Make no mistake about it, inflation is a tax and not by accident. — Ronald Reagan
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