April PPI

Sorry for the infrequency of my posting lately; I’m in the midst of the end-of-semester crunch right now, and won’t be able to catch my breath for another few days. But I did manage to check in with this morning’s April PPI report from the BLS… and found a surprisingly high inflation reading for the types of goods that firms buy:

The Producer Price Index for Finished Goods advanced 0.6 percent in April, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. This increase followed a 0.7-percent rise in March and a 0.4-percent gain in February… Among finished goods, much of April’s increase was due to a 2.1 percent advance in the energy goods index… Excluding prices for foods and energy, the index for finished goods increased 0.3 percent in April, compared with a 0.1 percent gain in the prior month.

I’ll do the usual monthly inflation round-up after the release of April’s Consumer Price Index tomorrow.

Kash