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US stock exchange New York Stock Exchange: US inflation rises to five percent
Photo: BRENDAN MCDERMID / REUTERS
US inflation is rising faster than expected.
Compared to the same month last year, the cost of living rose by 5.0 percent, such as the Department of Labor in Washington announced.
This is the highest rate since August 2008. In April the inflation rate was 4.2 percent, which was already higher than experts had expected.
For May, the analysts had only expected an increase to 4.7 percent.
"The dreaded five has become a reality," said Thomas Altmann from QC Partners.
This is the highest value since 2008. The sharp rise impressively shows that the price surge in April was not a slip-up, said LBBW analyst Dirk Chlench.
"The US Federal Reserve is coming under increasing pressure to reconsider its view that the latest price hikes are only of a temporary nature."
Core inflation, excluding often fluctuating components such as energy and food, was 3.8 percent in May compared with the same month last year.
The last time there was such a sharp increase was in 1992.
In April, the core inflation rate was 3.0 percent, analysts had expected 3.5 percent for May.
With the current price data, the target inflation rate of the US Federal Reserve (Fed) of two percent is still clearly exceeded.
However, the central bank has already signaled to the Fed that it does not want to react to the price increase for the time being.
She regards the development as a transitional phenomenon and is currently again orienting itself strongly towards the labor market.
The monthly labor market report disappointed recently.
Analysts do not want to overestimate price increases
Analysts did not want to overestimate the price increase in May either. "Even if higher inflation rates will accompany us for a little longer, it is essentially a matter of special effects from the corona pandemic," wrote chief economist Thomas Gitzel from VP Bank. It will take a certain amount of time before the price dust that has been stirred up subsides again. The US service sector is running in normal mode again in many places, prices for air travel and hotel accommodation are picking up again.
At the same time, the shortage of semiconductors is now at least indirectly affecting consumer prices.
If there are no new cars due to a lack of semiconductors, customers switched to used cars, said Gitzel.
And so the prices for used cars and trucks rose particularly sharply on a monthly basis.
According to the Ministry of Labor, this category alone is responsible for around a third of the monthly price increase.
hba / dpa / Reuters