Odaily News Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell warned on Wednesday against reading too much into data showing the biggest month-on-month increase in the Consumer Price Index in more than a year, while also acknowledging that the reading was significantly higher than expected.
Powell said at a hearing of the House Financial Services Committee: "The CPI reading was higher than almost all forecasts, but I just want to remind you of two points. First, we will not be excited by one or two good readings, nor will we be excited by one or two bad readings. Second, our inflation target focuses on the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index because we think it is a better measure of inflation. Therefore, you need to know the conversion from CPI to PCE, and tomorrow we will get more relevant data from the producer price index (PPI). We will know the PCE reading later tomorrow." (Sina Finance)