Inflation is still too high for the Fed to cut rates
A customer shops at a Target store on May 20, 2024 in Miami. Target said it plans to cut prices on thousands of products amid growing resistance to higher consumer costs.
Is some good news on U.S. inflation heading our way? Wall Street is banking on a slowdown in prices in a key inflation report for April on Friday (8:30 a.m. ET) that could help stem a recent downdraft in the stock market.
The PCE index is forecast to show a 0.3% increase when the April figures are reported on Friday morning. Some analysts have even penciled in a smaller 0.2% increase.
The PCE is the Federal Reserve’s preferred price barometer because it’s the most comprehensive measure of inflation. The index posted a surprising surge in the first three months of the year and forced the Fed to postpone plans to cut interest rates.
More crucially, investors are paying close attention to the so-called core rate of inflation that strips out food and energy. The Fed views the core rate as a better predictor of what future inflation will look like.
The core rate is forecast to rise a milder 0.2%, which would be the smallest increase so far in 2024.
If the forecasts are spot on, the yearly rate of increase in the PCE index could slip to 2.6% from 2.7%. That’s not a very far from the Fed’s goal of 2% annual inflation.
The increase in the core rate over the past year could dip to 2.7% from 2.8% and touch the lowest level in more than three years.
By contrast, the better known consumer price index showed a 3.4% increase in the 12 months ended in April.
Don’t expect any huge surprises in the PCE report. The index seldom veers much from Wall Street forecasts because so much of the report is derived from previously reported data.
Still, even a more benign PCE inflation report for April is not expected to raise the odds of the Fed cutting interest rates soon.
Fed officials have been disappointed by the spike in inflation in early 2024 and are likely to wait until mid or late summer before reducing rates. And only if inflation continues to slow.
The increase in inflation in the first three months of the year, if viewed as an annual rate, is actually running above 3%. The Fed wants to see the annualized three-month rate drop below 3% before its worries about inflation begin to ease.
“Regardless of how one opts to look at the data, we think the bigger issue is that there are still considerable inflation pressures in the pipeline,” said chief economist Richard Moody of Regions Financial.
Also in the inflation report, Wall Street will be watching consumer spending closely. It’s forecast to show a mild 0.3% increase.
Consumer spending slowed to a 2% annual pace in the first quarter from 3%-plus growth in each of the final two quarters of 2023, suggesting the economy has lost some momentum.
A slower economy, however, could further ease the upward pressure on inflation and pave the way for Fed rate cuts.
Lower borrowing costs would offer big financial relief to home and car buyers and businesses seeking to invest.