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| April Consumer Prices (#1) - May. 17, 2006 |
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Summary
Earlier this morning, the Labor Department reported that the Consumer Price Index rose 0.6% during April, an acceleration from March's reported increase of 0.4%.
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* The Labor Department reported this morning that the Consumer Price Index rose 0.6% in April, which compared with a 0.4% increase during March.
* April's increase was led by a 3.9% rise in energy prices. Costs in this sector were reported to have increased 1.3% in March, while having registered a 1.2% decline in February.
* Based on this morning's report, there was no change in food prices during April, versus 0.1% increases in both March and February.
* Also contributing to the CPI's April increase was a large 2.4% rise in transportation costs, accompanied by a 0.6% increase in apparel prices.
* Excluding food and energy, the so-called "core" rate, a convention that in my opinion is tantamount to absurd, the CPI was up 0.3% during April, matching a reported 0.3% increase in March.
* The consensus estimates for the overall as well as core results were around 0.5% and 0.2%, respectively.
* For the 12 months ended April 2006, the overall CPI stood 3.6% higher than a year earlier. During the 12 months ended April 2005, this figure was +3.5%.
* The 12-month change in the CPI's core rate as of April 2006 was 2.3%, which compared with a 2.2% gain for the 12 months ended April 2005. As usual, it is the core the comparison that will be all receive heaviest attention today on CNBC and similar venues of the be happy, don't worry, mentality.
Today's CPI release is the third and last of the government inflation series we follow closely each month (import prices, PPI and CPI), I will soon publish a more detailed statistical analysis of all three measures. I also will update the "Inflation Watch" graph on the home page of the GRA website.
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