UK CPI Review: Inflation Being Fuelled But Wages Still on the Wane?

April 22, 2026 6:35 AM UTC

What are energy induced price rises are now very evident, most notably in PPI data as well as the more closely watched CPI figures. Thus after a stable 3.0% (a 10-mth low) February’s headline – matching the consensus, headline CPI jumped to 3.3% in March.  Services, however, rose from 4.3% a fo

U.S. March Pending Home Sales - Stronger than expected but no clear trend

April 21, 2026 2:18 PM UTC

Pending home sales have seen an unexpected 1.5% increase in March, a second straight gain, though the declines of December and January have still not been fully reversed, and the yr/yr picture remains marginally negative.

U.S. March Retail Sales - Underlying resilience, lower taxes may be helping

April 21, 2026 1:02 PM UTC

March retail sales with a 1.7% rise, 1.9% ex autos are stronger than expected. Most of the rise is on the surging price of gasoline, though sales ex auto and gasoline with a 0.6% increase are on the firm side of expectations, with February revised up to 0.6% from 0.4% and January to 0.4% from 0.2%.

UK Labor Market: Lower Jobless Rates Misleading, as Wage Pressures hit New Cycle -Low

April 21, 2026 6:54 AM UTC

There are further signs that the labor market is haemorrhaging jobs both clearly and broadly with fresh falls in the more authoritative measure of jobs covering payrolls.  Indeed, private sector payrolls are still falling, down over 0.5 ppt in y/y terms.  Admittedly, headlines may be formed around

Canada - BoC Q1 Business Outlook Survey - Stronger but not fully catching war impact

April 20, 2026 7:42 PM UTC

The Bank of Canada’s Q1 business outlook survey released earlier today was generally improved, with the business outlook indicator of -0.36 from -1.78 the strongest since Q4 2022, with respondents reporting less of a drag from trade tensions. The survey may be however overstating current optimism,

Eurozone; ECB Tone More Neutral Than Suggested by March Meeting Market Reaction?

April 16, 2026 12:18 PM UTC

Little new can be taken from the minutes to the March ECB Council 19 meeting, save that at least to us the ECB was too optimistic about growth and too pessimistic about inflation. In regard to the latter, while acknowledging tighter financial conditions, the ECB still seemed to be downplaying what a

UK GDP Review (Apr 16): Fresh But Fleeting Momentum Before the War

April 16, 2026 7:10 AM UTC

Without the outbreak of the Iran War there was already a split within the MPC about the policy outlook and that such divisions may have been accentuated by this latest GDP update which showed a very much above consensus m/m rise of 0.5%, the strongest in 14 months. But of course, the conflict has ch

Eurozone: ECB Downplaying Supply of Credit as it Focuses on its Cost

April 14, 2026 1:35 PM UTC

Even amid increasing suggestions that the Middle East conflict will reap marked real economy damage that should limit the length and extent of any inflation surge, markets are still pricing in almost three 25 bp ECB hikes in the coming year.  We think this is still very excessive and reflects an ou

U.S. March NFIB survey slips but no surge in prices

April 14, 2026 11:27 AM UTC

March’s NFIB survey of Small Business Optimism has seen the optimism index fall by 3.0 points to 95.8, reaching its lowest levels since April 2025 as tariffs were implemented. 

U.S. March Existing Home Sales - A weak month, downside risk in Q2

April 13, 2026 2:24 PM UTC

March existing home sales with a 3.6% decline to 3.98m are weaker than expected. There may be some lagged impact from bad weather in late February but if energy prices remain elevated, restricting the ability of the Fed to ease, there are downside risks in Q2.

U.S. March Budget Deficit little changed yr/yr

April 10, 2026 6:21 PM UTC

March’s budget deficit of $164.1bn is marginally up from $160.5bn in March 2025, a second straight month in which the deficit was little changed yr/yr, though the deficit is still slightly lower in the fiscal year to date.

As We Expected, Russia’s Inflation Stood at 5.9% in March

April 10, 2026 5:13 PM UTC

Bottom Line: As we expected, Russian inflation hit 5.9% in March owing to lagged impacts of previous aggressive monetary tightening and relative resilience of RUB. According to Rosstat’s announcement on April 10, prices increased by 0.6% in March on a monthly basis following a 0.7% rise the prev

U.S. March CPI - Subdued core rate provides relief

April 10, 2026 12:55 PM UTC

March CPI is as the market expected with a 0.9% increase (0.865% before rounding) led by a surge in energy, but the core rate ex food and energy shows little sign of feed through, rising by a lower than expected 0.2%, with the gain before rounding at 0.196%, the slowest since November’s subdued tw

U.S. Personal Income slips, Core PCE Prices remain firm

April 9, 2026 1:17 PM UTC

The latest US data is mostly on the weak side of expectations, most notably a 0.1% decline in personal income for February that significantly underperformed a 0.5% rise in spending (itself slightly below expectations) which saw the savings rate slip back after a tax cut-assisted bounce in January. 0

Eurozone: Manufacturing Seeing Excess Supply Not Excess Demand

April 8, 2026 11:13 AM UTC

In Europe generally, but especially in the EZ, it will be manufacturing that will bear the brunt of the recent jump in energy prices, where industrial electricity prices even before the conflict started were among the highest globally. While high energy costs affect all sectors, manufacturing’s re

New York Fed survey shows U.S. inflation expectations higher in March, even on a 5-year view

April 7, 2026 3:14 PM UTC

The New York Fed’s March Survey of Consumer Expectations shows expectations have been lifted by the surge in energy prices, most obviously at the 1-year level, but with impacts visible at the 3-year and even 5-year levels.