The Producer Price Index as released by the BLS, this A.M.
The Producer Price Index for final demand increased 1.4 percent in March, seasonally adjusted, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. This rise followed advances of 0.9 percent in February and 1.2 percent in January. (See table A.) On an unadjusted basis, final demand prices moved up 11.2 percent for the 12 months ended in March, the largest increase since 12-month data were first calculated in November 2010.
I wish I could see a silver lining, but with the input costs remaining above the demand stage levels... hard to do.
Supply chain and harbor congestion. It would appear the west coast congestion is easing, but it also appears the backlog has been shifted to east and gulf coast regions. Intermodal is still struggling with congestion and we all have heard the dire warnings of truck driver shortages.
I can't help but think that just-in-time is dead and has been replaced by just-in-case. Which would mean a whole lot of inventory build-up staring into the potential abyss of consumer pullback in purchasing.
A better view of that, might come with tomorrow's advance retail sales outlook... which will contain numerous revisions.
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