US: The general theme likely to be higher inflation

It is a very big week for US data as the last major reports ahead of the Federal Reserve’s September FOMC meeting come in. Consumer and producer price inflation, retail sales and industrial production are all due, with the general theme likely to be higher inflation than seen of late versus weaker activity relative to recent trends. Nonetheless, Federal Reserve officials are seemingly of the mindset that they will likely pause interest rate hikes again and re-evaluate in November with just 2bp of policy tightening priced for later this month.

For inflation, we look for fairly big jumps in August’s month-on-month headline readings with upside risk relative to consensus predictions. Higher gasoline prices will be the main upside driver, but we also see the threat of a rebound in airfares and medical care costs, plus higher insurance prices. These factors are likely to also contribute to core CPI coming in at 0.3% MoM rather than the 0.2% figures we have seen in the previous two months. Slowing housing rents will be evident, but it may not be enough to offset as much as the market expects. Nonetheless, the year-on-year rate of core inflation will slow to perhaps 4.4%. We are hopeful we could get down to 4% YoY in the September report and not too far away from 3.5% in October. We would characterise these relatively firm MoM inflation prints as a temporary blip in what is likely to be an intensifying disinflationary trend.

Indeed, it was interesting to see the Fed’s Beige Book characterise recent consumer spending strength as being led by tourism expenditure, which had been "surging". But the general sense was that this would be "the last stage of pent-up demand for leisure travel from the pandemic era". Moreover, other spending was softer, "especially on non-essential items". This may well show up in the retail sales report. We already know that auto volume sales fell quite heftily too, but remember this is a value figure and that higher prices, particularly for gasoline, will help keep overall retail sales just about in positive territory. But with savings being rapidly exhausted and credit card delinquencies on the rise, there are concerns that weaker numbers are coming – particularly with student loan repayments restarting, which will add to financial stresses on the household sector.

Rounding out the reports, we expect industrial production to be much softer than the 1% jump seen last month. Manufacturing surveys continue to point to contraction, and weakness in the component could offset a bit of firmness in utilities and mining/drilling activities.