US consumer inflation cooled more than expected in June, government data showed today, as energy prices fell on a temporary cooling of the US-Iran war.<\/p>\n
With the recent renewal of hostilities between Washington and Tehran, and US President Donald Trump ordering the restart of a blockade of Iranian ports, the progress could be fleeting.<\/p>\n
The consumer price index (CPI) rose by 3.5% on a year-on-year basis in June, down from a 4.2% increase in May, the Labor Department said.<\/p>\n
The figure marked a pullback from a three-year high, as a drop in energy costs more than offset upticks in housing and food.<\/p>\n
Analysts had anticipated a larger 3.8% CPI uptick, according to economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.<\/p>\n
Yet, the cooldown is unlikely to fully ease worries over costs.<\/p>\n
A return of fighting this month, and Trump’s declaration that a ceasefire was over in the Middle East, have been pushing oil prices upwards again.<\/p>\n
US Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh is due to appear before the House Financial Services Committee following his first interest rate meeting at the helm of the central bank.<\/p>\n
US lawmakers are expected to grill him over progress on lowering inflation in the world’s biggest economy, among other issues.<\/p>\n
While the Fed has a longer run inflation target of 2%, cost hikes have been higher than that level for around five years.<\/p>\n
Warsh, in prepared remarks released today, is set to vow that the Fed will rid the US of the years-long “inflation surge.”<\/p>\n
“The Fed’s number one objective is to get monetary policy right – or as near to it as we possibly can,” he says in his prepared remarks.<\/p>\n
“If we get policy right – and we will – the inflation surge of the last five years will be a thing of the past,” he adds.<\/p>\n
For now, US gasoline costs plunged by 9.7% in June on a monthly basis – though they still remain higher than a year ago.<\/p>\n
CPI fell by 0.4% between May and June too, in the first month-on-month decline since 2020.<\/p>\n
Energy prices rocketed this year after US-Israeli strikes targeting Iran from late February triggered Tehran’s retaliation in virtually blocking off the Strait of Hormuz. The strait is a key waterway for global energy transit.<\/p>\n
While energy costs slumped in June, the cost of food climbed by 0.2% on a monthly basis.<\/p>\n
Excluding the volatile food and energy sectors, overall CPI was up by 2.6% year-on-year.<\/p>\n
The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the Personal Consumption Expenditures (CPE) price index, is due to be released July 30.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"US consumer inflation cooled more than expected in June, government data showed today, as energy prices fell on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":344691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[72,113,61,60],"class_list":["post-549393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=549393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}