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Last edited Tue Apr 14, 2026, 06:20 PM - Edit history (1)

# BLS SOURCE: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/ppi.nr0.htm
# PPI http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/WPSFD4
# PPI ex food, energy, and trade services http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/WPSFD49116

Percent increases, seasonally adjusted numbers, ANNUALIZED
1 mo 3 mo 12mo
---- ---- ----
6.3% 6.4% 4.0% Regular PPI (includes food & energy & trade services)
2.5% 4.8% 3.6% Core PPI (does not have food, energy, or trade services)

2.0% 2.0% 2.0% Federal Reserve Target



I added red lines at 2.0% which is the Federal Reserve's target, so to make clear how far from that goal prices are. The reason I annualize everything is so they can be compared to the 2% target.

One reason for the big increase in year-over-year despite "just" a 0.5% increase in March, is that a negative amount in March 2025 dropped out of the 12-month window. Yes, what drops out of the window is just as important in determining the size and direction of the 12-month average as what enters the window.



The BLS features the above two in their news release. The news release never mentions a PPI less food and energy.

Food, energy, and trade services are the volatile components

The trade services is very volatile:

See Table 1 in ppi.nr0.htm: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/ppi.t01.htm
Trade Services month-over-month percentage increases in the last 5 months were:
. . . +0.2%, +2.0%, +2.0%, -0.4%, -0.3%,

Trade services increase over last 12 months: +4.2%

The volatility is why they strip it out of their core measure (actually they never use the word "core" )