E-piphany

Below is a summary of my post-CPI tweets. You can (and should!) follow me @inflation_guy. Or, sign up for email updates to my occasional articles here. Investors with interests in this area be sure to stop by Enduring Investments or Enduring Intellectual Properties (updated sites coming soon). Plus…buy my book about money and inflation. The title of the book is What’s Wrong with Money? The Biggest Bubble of All; order from Amazon here.

• Welcome to another CPI day. The tone going into this one is soooo much different than last month. We are coming off of a surprising jump in core CPI of 0.29%, rather than three straight weak numbers, for starters.
• For another, the Fed is already in easing mode; last month we were just preparing for it. Despite the high inflation print, and median CPI near its highs y/y (2.84%), the Fed eased anyway.
• (If you needed any more evidence that the Fed cares more about the stock market and “risk management” of forward growth expectations, than about inflation, that was an exhibit for you.)
• With global growth sliding, protests in Hong Kong, the Argentinian peso collapsing…this CPI number today won’t change the Fed’s trajectory. They’re going to keep easing for a while.
• I expect inflation to peak later in Q4 or in Q1, but in the meantime it may make the Fed feel a bit uncomfortable. List 4 tariffs being implemented will probably finally result in a tariff effect (not for a few months, as they take effect Sep 1).
• As for today: last month’s jump was fueled by housing, and by used (not new, not leased) cars and trucks. Most of that was catch-up although housing’s strength is a little surprising.
• I don’t expect retracements there. And there’s upside risk from medical care, especially hospital services, though it’s hard to time.
• Recent increases in the CPI for health insurance, which is a residual, may indicate coming acceleration in inflation for drugs and/or hospital services, which are due. Hard to time this though.
• Consensus on the Street is for roughly 0.19% on core CPI. That would keep y/y steady, right at 2.1%. Good luck.
• Well whoopsie. Another 0.29% on core CPI. That brings y/y core to 2.21%
• This makes the lull earlier this year look decidedly different.

• Let’s see. Lodging Away from Home jumps out, retracing a -0.64% fall last month to +0.94% this month, but that’s only 1% of CPI.
• Primary Rents and OER both were better behaved this month, +0.28% and +0.25%, but that actually lowers the y/y for both of them.
• Heh heh…did someone say hospital services? It rose 0.46% m/m, pushing the y/y to 0.77% from 0.50%. No real victory lap for me yet…it’s got a long way to go.

• Pharma was also positive, +0.29% m/m versus -0.46% m/m last. Overall, Medical Care rose to 2.57% y/y versus 1.96% last month. Medical Care is about 9% of CPI.
• Used cars and trucks accelerated to 1.47% y/y versus 1.25%. So no retracement to the bounce last month. I hadn’t expected any since the move last month looked like a return to fair.
• Apparel +0.44% m/m. That takes the y/y to -0.55% versus -1.29% last month. Couple of months ago there was a sharp fall as BLS shifted to a new methodology. Looks like this is catching up. Still mild deflation in apparel, no tariff effects.
• Overall, Core Goods was +0.40% y/y. Wait, what?? About time! HIGHEST Y/Y CORE GOODS SINCE 2013. The persistent-deflation-in-goods narrative just took a hickey.

• However, hold the victory lap on that. Model says we may be close to the highs on core goods. (But the model doesn’t know about tariffs.)

• This is rare…Other Goods and Services, the eighth of eight major subgroups in CPI, rose 0.52% m/m. That category (only 3% of CPI) is a dog’s breakfast so unusual to see a m/m jump that large. Will be worth looking into.
• Core inflation ex-shelter rose to 1.31% y/y from 1.16% last month.
• New Vehicles and Leased Cars and Trucks both decelerated further. So if anyone ‘blames’ used cars for the strong print, point out that overall “New and used motor vehicles” decelerated to 0.30% y/y from 0.43%. This kind of talk will make you popular at parties.
• CPI for health insurance continued to surge, now up 15.88% y/y. Remember, this is a residual, but I think that means it may signal changes that the BLS hasn’t picked up yet. It’s the highest on record.

• Back to that dog’s breakfast of “Other”. Nothing really stands out. This category has cigarettes, personal care products (cosmetics, etc), personal care services (haircuts, e.g.), funeral expenses, legal services, financial services, dry cleaning…pretty balanced increases.
• Biggest declines this month are jewelry and watches (-17% annualized) and infants’ and toddlers’ apparel (-12.8% annualized). Bunch of annualized >10% gains tho: Mens’ & boys’ and womens’ & girls’ apparel, public transportation, lodging away from home, tobacco, motor fuel.
• Early look at median CPI…my estimate is 0.28% m/m, which would put y/y to 2.88% and a new high.
• OK, time for the four-pieces charts. And then a wrap-up. First, Food & Energy.

• Second piece: Core goods. This is really where the story is, and where it’s likely to be going forward. A reminder here about how long the inflation process can take! Folks were looking for tariff effects the moment they went into effect. But businesses wait-and-see first.

• Now businesses have seen, and the tariffs look to be pretty sturdy, and they’re moving prices. And more to come probably.
• Core services less rent of shelter. Medical Care maybe has stopped going down, but it isn’t going up yet.

• And the stable Rent of Shelter. A little surprised it’s so buoyant still.

• Well, the wrap-up is obvious here. Second 0.3% core month in a row, and no obvious outliers. The acceleration seems to be concentrated in core goods, but fairly broad. I still think we will see inflation peak later 2019 or early 2020, but…there are no signs of it yet.
• So this is what the Fed faces: slowing global growth, political unrest, and rising inflation. In that circumstance, will they keep easing? OF COURSE THEY WILL, THEY DON’T CARE ABOUT INFLATION. Haven’t for a decade at least.
• And what about markets? 10-year inflation swaps are shown below, compared to Median CPI (last point estimated). There’s a serious disconnect here.

• So as Porky says, “That’s all, folks!” Thanks for tuning in. I’ll put the summary of these tweets up on my site mikeashton.wordpress.com within the hour.

What is amazing about inflation is both how slowly it changes and also how quickly it changes. Three months ago we were looking at four soft months in a row on core CPI and people were starting to chirp about the coming deflation. Then we get two of the highest core prints in a long time – and broad-based at that – and the story will be 180 degrees different. (Another reason to watch Median CPI rather than Core CPI is that the head fakes aren’t very good in Median – there was never much question that the broad trend was staying higher).

To be sure, the Fed doesn’t really care about inflation, and markets don’t much care either. Unless, that is, it causes the Administration to slow its march toward tariffs. As I write this, the Trump Administration has announced they will delay the tariffs on “some” products – including cell phones, laptops, video game consoles, some toys, and some apparel – until December 15th (just in time for Christmas, but it means that these goods won’t see prices higher during the holiday shopping season since everything on store shelves will have already been imported. Thanks Wal-Mart!). Stocks have taken that as a signal to rip higher because the fact that inflation is rising on 98% of the consumption basket is so one-hour-ago. Happy days are here again!

But make no mistake. The inflation pressures are not all from tariffs. In fact, few of them seem to be specifically traceable to tariffs. This is a continuation of a broad accelerating trend we have seen for several years. See above: inflation changes slowly. The Federal Reserve will ignore this because they believe the slower global growth will restrain inflation so that there is nothing they need to do about it. In some sense they are right, because the market has already lowered interest rates by so much it is likely to push money velocity lower again. I still think inflation will peak later this year or early next year, but if I were on the FOMC…I’d be somewhat nervous about that projection today.