The Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased +0.3% in October, and was up +2.5% over the previous 12 months. One-third of the monthly increase was due to a +3.0% increase in the price of gasoline, with additional input from price increases for shelter, used vehicles, and electricity. Prices dropped slightly over the month for food, new vehicles, and medical care commodities. On a yearly basis, prices were up +8.9% for energy, led by increases in fuel oil (+26.2%) and gasoline (+16.1%), while prices were down -2.1% for piped gas. Food prices were up +1.2% for the year, with food at home only rising +0.1% while food away from home rose +2.5%. Excluding food and energy, prices increased +0.2% for the month, and +2.5% for the year, with yearly prices increasing notably for transportation (+3.8%), shelter (+3.2%), an medical care services (+1.9%).

Retail sales for for October were up +0.8% to $511.5 billion, while September’s sales were revised downward to $507.6 billion (-0.1%). The retail sales report does not track the effect of price changes, and the increase in sales at gasoline stations, leading the report with a +3.5% for the month and +16.2% for the year, closely matches the price increases reported in the CPI report. Nonstore retailers, which include online stores, had the second highest yearly gains after gasoline sales at +12.1%. Department stores gained +1.3% for the month, outpacing a +0.5% gain for general merchandise stores, but still fell -0.3% for the year. Yearly sales also fell for motor vehicle dealers (-0.7%) and sporting goods/hobby/book stores (-8.5%).

Industrial production increased +0.1% in October, with September’s estimate of a +0.3% increase revised downward to +0.2%. Mining production had reached an all-time high in August due mostly to oil and gas production, and is still up +13.1% for the year, but has now dropped for the second month in a row with a -0.3% decline following September's -0.1% drop. Utilities dropped -0.5%, with a -1.9% drop in electric production being offset by a +8.6% gain in natural gas production. Although motor vehicle assembly production fell -2.8%, overall manufacturing was up +0.3%, with an overall increases of +0.5% for durable and +0.2% for nondurable manufacturing. Capacity utilization rose +0.1% to 76.2% for manufacturing, but still remains below its long run average of 78.3%, while utilization fell for both mining (-0.8% to 92.7%) and utilities (-0.5% to 77.3%). Mining utilization remains near an all time high versus its long run rate of 87.0%, while utilities utilization remains below its long run rate of 85.3%.