If you can imagine any good news at all on the economic front, inflation is running at very low levels.  January’s CPI was +0.3% and +0.2% on the core level.

Bloomberg had consensus levels at +0.3% on the nominal CPI and +0.1% on the core reading which excludes food and energy.

The December CPI of -0.7 was also revised to to -0.8%.

The two largest gaining components this month were energy at +1.7% and transportation at +1.3%, but these readings were both down massively in December.

These numbers were right in line with expectations.  The good thing is that this does not follow yesterday’s producer pricing gains and is not at all a major risk of the “deflation” fears of many economists.

JON C. OGG
February 20, 2009