Producer Prices Rise Less Than Expected; Futures Gain 0.6%
Producer inflation came in below expectations in October. PPI, released at 8:30 a.m. ET (4:30 p.m. in Istanbul), rose 0.3% on the month against a 0.4% forecast. The annual rate was 6.5%, versus 6.6% expected.
The monthly slowdown is clear: the index rose 1.4% in September. Still, 6.5% is the highest annual rate since November 2022. The measure excluding food, energy and trade services rose 0.5% on the month and 4.9% on the year.
The components diverged. Goods rose 0.5% while energy slipped 0.1% and food jumped 1.3%. Services rose 0.2% for a fifth straight month, with transportation and warehousing up 2.0%.
The market read the data as relief: no second inflation surprise followed Tuesday's hot CPI. As of 8:36 a.m. ET, S&P 500 futures were up 0.6% and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.5%. A December hike stays priced in; the debate is now about its size.
Nvidia's new reference point is Thursday's close. The stock, down 9% in Thursday's premarket, finished the day 4.3% lower at $166.19. It is up 1% to 3% in premarket today, with third-quarter earnings due after the close on Tuesday, November 17.
Microsoft is down about 2% in premarket. A global outage that began Thursday hit Outlook, Teams and Copilot, and some users are still affected today. fell 16.8% on Thursday after weak guidance.
