Prices
Inflation, read the way its builders do — CPI, PCE, PPI, and the detail tables.
BEA's annual revision, released with August PCE on September 30, cut July's 12-month core rate to 3.0% from 3.3%; new prices for investment fees and software account for 0.34 of the 0.36-point cut. August core rose 0.25% and held at 3.0% (3.3% was forecast, matching the old measurement). Core's three-month pace slowed on both measures, to 2.0% revised and about 2.4% the old way, from 3.7% in May. Core PCE exceeds core CPI by 0.56 points. August core CPI (Sep 11) rose 0.29% against a 0.2% forecast, a third of it wireless phone service's record 5.9% jump, while its 12-month rate fell to 2.4%, the lowest since March 2021. ISM's factory prices index rose to 77.9 in September from 71.1 as the share of factories paying more went to 58.6% from 46.2%. September CPI lands October 14.
- October 5, 2026 Half of Services Firms Paid More in September, Matching April and May ISM
Half of services firms, 50.3 percent, paid higher prices in September, up from 44.8 percent in August and level with April and May. ISM's prices index rose to 74.0, which ISM calls its highest since July 2022; April's was 70.7, because this year's seasonal factors take four points off April's reading and almost nothing off September's. The share of services firms paying more has regained nearly all of its summer decline, and the share of factories half. About as many services firms cut staff as added, and the employment index was 50.1.
- September 11, 2026 Cellphone Plans Were a Third of August's 0.3 Percent Core Rise CPI
Core prices rose 0.29 percent in August against a 0.2 forecast. A third of the rise was cellphone plans, up a record 5.9 percent on a BLS method that has produced four moves above 2 percent in 14 months; without them core rose 0.2, and without falling medical and car-insurance prices as well, 0.28. Owners' equivalent rent slowed to a 2.8 percent three-month pace from 3.2.
- September 1, 2026 Fewer Factories Reported Rising Orders in August ISM
August's ISM factory index slipped to 54.6 from July's four-year high of 55.6, with new orders accounting for most of the drop and factory hiring nearly balanced between firms adding staff and firms cutting. The prices index repeated July's 71.1, but the table underneath moved: half of factories now report no change in input costs, 4 percent report decreases, and no industry paid less. The survey covers August; Brent rose 7.6 percent the following week, after the August 30–31 tanker attacks. Waller tied his September vote to the inflation data due before the meeting; the August CPI on September 11 is that data, not this report.
- August 26, 2026 Investment Fees Were Half of July's Core PCE Increase PCE
Half of July's 0.246 percent core PCE increase came from investment-management fees, which are billed against client assets and reprice off the prior quarter's stock market. The same line carried 42 percent of last July's increase. Strip it out and core still runs 3.0 percent over 12 months, more than a point above the Fed's objective — and BEA changes how it prices the line on September 30.
- August 13, 2026 The Producer Core Is Running Faster Than Its 4.7 Percent Annual Rate PPI
Producer core inflation's 12-month rate fell to 4.7 percent from 5.0, but its three-month pace is 5.1 percent annualized — the annual figure is catching down to a run rate that has not moved as much. Freight is about 0.25 points of the 0.35-point annual decline, and half of freight's own slowdown is a strong July 2025 leaving the window.
- August 12, 2026 Core Inflation Slowed to 2.5 Percent, but Rents Did Not CPI
Core CPI rose 0.2 percent in July and 2.5 percent over 12 months, the smallest rise since February. The rent measures took no part in it: owners' equivalent rent rose 0.26 percent, a 3.2 percent pace identical to its 12-month rate, and has held between 3.1 and 3.3 percent every month since January. Shelter printed 0.14 percent only because lodging fell 2.8 percent — a line BLS reports with a 1.6-point standard error.
- July 30, 2026 Core PCE Slowed to 0.1% After Three Fed Officials Voted to Hike PCE
Core PCE rose 0.1% in June — the softest month since March 2025 — and the 3-month annualized rate fell below 3% for the first time since December, the morning after three FOMC members voted to hike. The cooling survives stripping the volatile financial-services swing, but even at June's pace the 12-month rate is still about 3% in September — cooler, but still about 3 percent into fall.
- July 15, 2026 Freight and Exports Carry a Third of Producer Core Inflation PPI
Producer prices fell 0.3% in June as the spring oil spike reversed through every stage of goods production, confirming June CPI. Producer core inflation held at 5.1%, but freight and exports are 19% of that core and 37% of its inflation — BLS's consumer-only version runs 4.8%. The distributor margins May's note called a buffer compressed hard in May, expanded in June, and are up 3.3% over the year.
- 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 6, 2026 Services Price Pressure Eased to a Four-Month Low Without a Slump 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 1, 2026 Factory Cost Pressure Is Fading, Leaving Services as the Fed's Problem 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 25, 2026 PCE Inflation Runs Above CPI Because It Weights Health Care More 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 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.
- June 10, 2026 The Second Inflation Wave Is, So Far, an Oil Shock CPI
May CPI ran above forecast, but more than 60% was energy — so far a war-driven oil shock sitting on a core that hasn't broken out.