CPI report was everything investors feared

Nobody wanted to see that print.

Investors had been hoping to see evidence of inflation cooling, if only because they know the Federal Reserve will likely need multiple months of data—not just a single report—to decide its interest-rate increases are working. Thursday’s report effectively means investors are still at zero such reports.

Core CPI, excluding volatile food and energy prices, rose faster than economists expected. That means the Fed will likely not be able to start scaling back the size of its rate increases for some time yet.