Institution: Weak PPI is often accompanied by weak CPI

ChainCatcher news, Spectra Markets analyst Brent Donnelly stated that whether weak PPI indicates weak CPI is not always the case, but it often happens. Recently, it has been somewhat rare for the U.S. Department of Labor to release PPI data in a month ahead of CPI data, but before 2018, this was the norm.

Looking back at the past 10 years: when both overall PPI and core PPI are below expectations—just like the recently released December data—CPI was above expectations only 21% of the time that month. Donnelly found that in this scenario, CPI met expectations 39% of the time and was below expectations 39% of the time. This suggests that the December CPI data released this Wednesday is less likely to be higher than Wall Street's expectations. Economists had previously predicted that consumer prices would rise by 0.3%. (Jin Shi)