WASHINGTON (AP) – Prices charged by U.S. producers rose in June at the fastest pace in 13 months, reflecting a big jump in the price of gasoline and other energy products.
The Labor Department says that its producer price index, which measures cost pressures before they reach the consumer, increased 0.5 percent in June. That was the largest one-month jump since a similar rise in May 2015.
Energy prices were up 4.1 percent last month while food costs rose 0.9 percent.
Core inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy, rose 0.4 percent in June, the biggest uptick since January. Even with the June acceleration, producer prices are up just 0.3 percent over the past 12 months, while core inflation is up a moderate 1.3 percent.
Those increases are similar to the moderate inflation being registered at the consumer level. A gauge of consumer prices preferred by the Federal Reserve has stayed below the Fed’s 2 percent target for more than four years. The central bank boosted a key interest rate by a quarter point in December and signaled that it planned to raise rates another four times this year.