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The US Inflation report came out today:

Price increases did cool slightly on an annual basis, with the Consumer Price Index climbing 6 percent over the year through February, the Labor Department said Tuesday. That was down from 6.4 percent in January, and matched the slowdown that economists expected. That seemed like an encouraging sign, but the underlying details of the report made the data more worrying.

Inflation looked far firmer beneath the surface. The price index climbed 0.5 percent from the previous month after it was stripped of food and fuel prices — both of which bounce around a lot — offering a sense of underlying price pressures. That was up from 0.4 percent in January and more than economists had forecast.

In fact, the increase was the fastest monthly pickup in the so-called core index since September, which is not the kind of progress central bankers are hoping for a year into their fight against inflation.
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But policymakers have watched with concern as price increases have spread into services categories, which include purchases like manicures, travel and restaurant meals. Those areas more closely reflect underlying economic momentum, and price pressures in them can be harder to stamp out.

In February, a measure of services inflation that excludes housing — a metric the Fed watches very closely — picked up notably on a monthly basis. Bloomberg’s version of the gauge climbed 0.43 percent last month, up from 0.27 percent in January.

Teachers had a good year:

Teachers’ annual return beat its internal benchmark of 2.3 per cent, and its net assets increased to $247.2-billion. The plan’s managers have set at target to reach $300-billion in assets by 2030.

Over 10 years, Teachers has returned 8.5 per cent, and the plan was considered fully funded at year-end.

The gains Teachers reported in 2022 stand in contrast to double-digit percentage losses for many public stock and bond indexes, which plunged last year as high inflation and rapidly rising interest rates created volatility in markets.
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By comparison, Royal Bank of Canada’s RBC I&TS All Plan Universe saw defined benefit pension plan assets – as measured by a typical mix of publicly held stocks and bonds – shrink 10.3 per cent last year, which was the largest loss since the 2008 financial crisis.
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Among other major pension plans, Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS) gained 4.2 per cent in 2022, while the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec lost 5.6 per cent. Yet the results of different plans are not directly comparable because of differences their portfolios, the makeup of their membership, their liabilities and plan structures.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 14th, 2023 at 7:13 pm and is filed under Market Action. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.