Latest
- July 14, 2026 The Oil Shock Reversed Without Reaching Core Inflation CPI
June CPI fell 0.4% — energy did essentially all of it, reversing the spring oil spike — and the passthrough into core inflation that May hinted at never came. Core prices were unchanged on the month, their softest since 2021.
- July 11, 2026 The Chip Rout and the Near-Record Index Are One Event Weekly
Semiconductors have lost about $2.1 trillion in value since June 22 — the median chip stock is down 21% — while the S&P 500 sits half a percent from its record. Both are one event: money rotating out of the AI leaders into the other 459 stocks. Under it, investors moved to about 70% odds of a Fed hike by September after minutes that scrubbed the easing bias; oil spiked and faded on Iran, June's home sales confirmed the North–South housing split, and Tuesday's CPI will print a negative headline from an oil collapse that has already partly reversed.
- July 6, 2026 Services Price Pressure Eased to a Four-Month Low — With No Slump in Activity ISM
June ISM services: activity held at 54.0 (a 13th straight month of expansion), services employment expanded for the first time in four months, and the prices index fell to 67.7 — its first reading below 70 since February. The bad combination would have been slowing activity with firm prices; June delivered steady activity and cooling costs. Both ISM cost gauges are now cooling, and July 14's CPI tests whether that reaches consumers.
- July 5, 2026 The South Has Homes but Few Buyers; the North Has Buyers but Few Homes Housing
Homes for sale in the 50 largest US metros have split by region — the South and West hold 12% more than before the pandemic, the North 36% fewer. Sellers don't explain it — they list about 18% fewer homes than in 2019 in both regions. Buyers do. In the South, homes under contract are down a fifth from 2019 and listing prices are falling; in the North, homes under contract are up 30% against far fewer listings, and prices hold flat while Southern prices fall.
- July 1, 2026 Factory Cost Pressure Is Fading — the Fed's Problem Is Services, Not Goods ISM
June ISM manufacturing held in expansion at 53.3, but the big move is the prices index — down 9.1 points to 73 as June's oil spike unwinds. That's real disinflation, and it's entirely goods. It doesn't reach the services core (PCE 3.4%) that keeps rates high — which Fed Chair Warsh reaffirmed in Sintra the same morning.
- June 30, 2026 Nobody's Quitting or Getting Fired JOLTS
May JOLTS — job openings held at 7.59M, above the 7.28M consensus, and layoffs stayed low. The labor-market break that would justify a rate cut still isn't here. Underneath, nothing is moving — quits sit below their pre-pandemic norm and the vacancy-to-unemployed ratio is back near one. The Beveridge curve shows a market that normalized without a recession.
- June 26, 2026 Cheaper Oil Isn't Cooling the Services Core Weekly
The bet on rate cuts rested on falling oil. This week oil kept falling — WTI down more than 10% to $70 as the Strait of Hormuz reopened — and the bet broke anyway, because core PCE hit a three-year high on services inflation that cheaper oil never touches.
- June 25, 2026 The Fed's Inflation Gauge Now Runs Above CPI — It Counts More Health Care PCE
Core PCE hit 3.4% — highest since October 2023 — and now runs above core CPI, inverting the usual relationship. It's the weighting — PCE counts far more health care than CPI, and that's where the inflation sits.
- June 20, 2026 The No-Hike Bet Rests on Oil Staying Down Weekly
Investors dismissed the Warsh Fed's higher-rate projections because the oil shock collapsed — but this week the floor under cheaper oil took its first hits, and core PCE on June 25 can't settle it.
- June 19, 2026 Warsh's Fed Projected a Hike Investors Don't Believe Weekly
The Warsh Fed flipped its forecast to a 2026 rate hike the market isn't pricing — the same week oil collapsed 25%.
- June 17, 2026 The Warsh Fed Signaled Higher Rates — Bond Investors Didn't Buy It FOMC
The Warsh Fed held rates but flipped its dot plot to a hike and marked inflation up; the 10-year yield held anyway.
- June 11, 2026 Producer Prices Are Up 6.5 Percent and Haven't Reached Consumers Yet PPI
May producer prices show upstream cost pressure building — a record monthly jump in goods and supercore at a four-year high — held out of consumer prices only by shrinking distributor margins.
Explainers
- June 19, 2026 Does the Fed follow through on dot-plot surprises?
Whether the Fed's dot-plot projections actually forecast its rate path — and how to read a fresh dot-plot surprise.