American consumers are spending more, getting less, and borrowing more to fund this involuntary spending spree.
Retail sales in March were 7% higher than they were in the stimulus-fueled March of 2021, but thanks to inflation, they didn’t get as much bang for their buck.
The Consumer Price Index hit 8.5% on an annualized basis in March, the highest level since 1981. In an attempt to get ahead of what everybody knew would be bad news, the Biden administration started blaming Russia for the big CPI before the data even came out. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said, “We expect March CPI headline inflation to be extraordinarily elevated due to Putin’s price hike.” The mainstream media quickly picked up that mantra. Peter Schiff appeared on the Megyn Kelly show and explained why this is a false narrative.
We got the CPI data for March this week. As expected, prices spiked significantly again last month. A lot of people in the mainstream are calling it “Putin’s price hike.” Friday Gold Wrap host Mike Maharrey says it would be more appropriate to call it Powell’s price hike. In this episode of the podcast, he digs into the CPI data and explains why the blame for high prices is largely misplaced and inflation probably hasn’t peaked.
As expected, the March Consumer Price Index was smoking hot with a 1.2% month-on-month increase and an 8.5% annual gain. But the mainstream found a silver lining in the numbers. Core inflation wasn’t quite as high as expected leading many to conclude that we’ve reached “peak inflation.” In his podcast, Peter Schiff said this is just wishful thinking.
The inflation freight train is still hurtling down the track at breakneck speed.
Everybody expected a big Consumer Price Index number for March. When it was all said and done, we got what was expected. And then some.
Peter Schiff recently appeared on Kitco News with David Lin to talk about inflation and the Fed’s attempt to get it under control. Peter said there is no getting inflation under control. It’s already worse than anybody thinks. And it’s only going to get higher.
Retail sales have gone up to start the year as Americans keep spending. But what are they buying?
Inflation.
American consumers are spending hand-over-fist in an effort to keep up with surging prices.
In another sign that the inflation train is far from running out of steam, producer prices were up big again in February.
The Producer Price Index (PPI) for final demand surged 0.8% month on month. This was close to the expectation. The annual increase in producer prices came in at 10%, tying the all-time record.
Last week, we got another big jump in consumer prices with the February CPI data. Peter Schiff appeared on Fox News with Tucker Carlson to talk about the rampant inflation. He said it’s only going to get worse. Inflation only has one way to go.
Up.
We got the February CPI data yesterday. There is some bad news in the report and then there is some really bad news. In this episode, SchiffGold Friday Gold Wrap Host Mike Maharrey breaks it all down. He also talks about gold’s rollercoaster ride this week in the context of inflation and the Russia-Ukraine situation.
