U.S. September CPI Slightly Below Expectations, Fed Rate Cut Prospects Brighten Ahead of Next Week

BlockBeats News, October 24th: The U.S. September CPI increase was slightly lower than expected, paving the way for the Fed to cut interest rates again next week. The U.S. Labor Department said on Friday that after rising 0.4% in August, the September CPI rose 0.3% month-on-month; the annual rate was recorded at 3.0%, slightly higher than August's 2.9% increase. Excluding the more volatile food and energy components, core CPI rose 0.2% month-on-month (compared to 0.3% in August), and the year-on-year increase decreased from 3.1% in August to 3.0%. Despite the government shutdown causing a halt in economic data releases, the CPI report was still published to assist the Social Security Administration in calculating the cost-of-living adjustment for millions of retirees and other benefit recipients in 2026, with the data originally scheduled for release on October 15th.

As businesses have worked through the inventory built up ahead of the broad Trump tariff implementation and absorbed some of the tax burden themselves, the transmission effects of import tariffs have been relatively gradual. Economists point out that businesses have achieved this at the expense of hiring and estimate that consumers have so far borne about 20% of the tariff costs. (FX678)