Investors this week are poised to receive a number of key economic data reports offering the latest look at the state of inflation in the U.S., with investors and consumers alike jittery at the prospects of rising prices during the post-pandemic recovery.
The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis will release its April personal consumption expenditures (PCE) index on Friday. The print is expected to show a rise of 3.5% in April over last year for the biggest increase since 2008, according to Bloomberg consensus data. This would also accelerate after a year-on-year jump of 2.3% in March. On a month-over-month basis, the PCE likely increased by 0.6%, accelerating after a 0.5% increase during the prior month.
Stripping away volatile food and energy prices, the so-called core PCE is expected to have increased by 2.9% in April over last year, which would be the largest jump in more than two decades.
Though the core PCE serves as the Federal Reserve's preferred inflation gauge, the expected surge in this week's inflation reports are unlikely to provoke immediate concern for the central bank. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has said repeatedly he believes inflationary pressures this year will be "transitory," largely reflecting base effects as this year's data lap last year's pandemic-depressed levels. And for years previously, inflation ran well below the central bank's targeted levels.