US Consumer Prices Up 8.3% in Year to August, Continue Dip From 40-Year Highs, Labor Dept Says

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - US consumer prices grew by 8.3% in the year to August, slowing for a second month in a row, Labor Department data showed on Wednesday, but economists said the retreat was unlikely to be enough to stop the Federal Reserve from approving another substantial rate in September to fight inflation.
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"The all items index increased 8.3 percent for the 12 months ending August, a smaller figure than the 8.5-percent increase for the period ending July", the department said in a news release referring to the all-items reading in the Consumer Price Index, or CPI.

In June, the CPI hit a 40-year high by growing at an annualized 9.1%.
It slowed to a growth of 8.5% in July after tumble in fuel prices, which went from a record high of just over $5 for a gallon of gasoline at US pumps in mid-June to below $4 by last month.
For August, economists had expected an 8.1% growth for the year and a negative 0.1% for the month.
The higher-than-expected final figures, that included a 0.1% increase — not decrease — for August, surprised forecasters, who concurred that the Fed was crawling rather than rolling in its fight against inflation.
Economists also said they expected the Fed to approve a third straight interest rate hike of 75 basis points when the central bank meets on September 21.

"A high CPI print raised the odds of a higher-for-longer [rates] scenario at the Federal Reserve", economist Adam Button said in a comment posted on the Forex Live forum.

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The Fed has raised rates by 225 basis points in four increases since March, with two back-to-back 75 basis point hikes in June and July, to curb runaway inflation.
The Fed’s target for inflation is a mere 2% a year and it has vowed to raise interest rates as much as necessary to achieve that.
Economists have cautioned that the Fed could end up pushing the United States into a deep recession with its sharpest rate hikes in four decades, saying the high-flying housing sector and one-time ebullient stock market could end up as the Fed’s victims.
Preliminary estimates show the US gross domestic product, or GDP, likely contracted by 0.6% in the second quarter after a 1.6% slowdown in the first quarter. Two straight quarters of GDP growth typically places an economy in a recession.
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