The CPI Report Just Came Out — Here Is Why You Should Be Worried

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Well, I need to give a warning to all credit card users because the CPI report came out this morning and what it stated, well, is a little bit concerning. It looks like the Federal Reserve is going to raise interest rates this next month. Look at this. It says consumer prices rose by 0.4% in October, more than expected and now complicating the Fed's inflation fight. Now, what exactly happened? Well, I want to read a few things to you. First off, look at this right here. It says the consumer price index, a broad gauge of costs across the U.S. economy, increased a seasonally adjusted 0.4% for the month. Economists surveyed were predicting a 0.3% increase, meaning it went up. It's a little bit higher than expected. But here's the reason why I'm warning all credit card users. When the Federal Reserve raises their benchmark rate, what happens is credit card interest rates go up as well. So you are going to pay more in interest. Here's the crazy thing, though. I want to show you something. It says stripping out volatile food and energy, so-called core CPI increased by 0.3% against the forecast for a 0.2% gain. It says the headline CPI had increased 0.6% in September, while core was 0.3%. So core stayed the same. But here's the problem, and this is something you're probably not going to see. You may not even notice it. I have been talking about month-over-month gains. It's gotten more expensive month-over-month. I want to show you something. It says the U.S. consumer prices top forecast. All right? So when you look at these numbers, okay, look at this one, October 2026. Here's a problem, though. We go back, right? You can kind of start to see it. September 2025. Do you notice something? There's a gap from September to December. October and November are not there. Why is this? Well, it's because last year, the federal government was shut down. So during those months, they didn't do all their data collection. All right? As a result of this, we do not know exactly what our CPI report is. We don't know what our inflation number is this month. Okay? We know what it was last month, but not this month. But here's why this is such a big deal. Okay? Americans are currently struggling with the cost of living. But if Americans are struggling with the cost of living, can't pay for a lot of the goods, services that we're getting, how is the Federal Reserve even considering raising interest rates to try to fight inflation? Right? Why wouldn't they consider lowering them to make it easier on the American people? That's the dilemma that we're in. And that's the problem that we faced for several years now is if we increase rates, it will push inflation down, but it hurts more people. If we lower rates, inflation is likely going to go up because more people can afford the basics, right? Even some luxuries. But I want to give you some statistics here. Here's where prices increase the most. All right? Just to give you an idea, this is from October 2026. Okay? These are seasonally adjusted. Things like snacks went up 1%. Gasoline went up 1%. This is month over month. Okay? Beef went up 0.9%. Electricity went up 0.9%. Auto insurance went 0.7%. Fruits and vegetables is up 0.6%. Groceries as a whole, 0.4%. And shelter, 0.3%. The only thing that went down in one of the main things is used cars went down 1.2%. Negative. Okay? Interesting. But this is what I find the most interesting. According to the reports this morning, the Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller, he said that he supports increasing interest rates this next round. He says we have to do it by at least 0.25 percentage points in December. He also indicated that larger 0.5 point increase should be considered if inflation reached 0.3% or higher. And well, it hit that exactly. So a little bit concerning there. Now, here's why I'm bringing this to your attention. When the Fed decides to raise interest, interest rates. Okay? It is, it's supporting, um, it's supporting jobs, supporting the economy, trying to really work with it. But here's what you need to know. Okay? Is that they are raising rates because we have persistent inflation? At the same time we have pretty steady employment. Okay? When they hold rates only doing this because chance are they're waiting for more evidence. Here's why that's a big deal. There's a, there's, there's pretty much no shot that we are going to lower rates. Okay? You only lower rates when inflation is extremely low, right? Um, you can, you can afford some additional spending. We're not there yet. So they say there's two options right now, holding interest rates where they're at, which could be good, or we can increase rates, which is going to make borrowing more expensive. So all credit card users, you're going to pay a little bit more. Here's what we know though. Okay. Or this is what we're being told that right now, the, the most likely outcome is they're going to raise interest rates. And this is going to happen on December 9th or 8th and 9th. Okay. But here's the only, here's the only catalyst. Here's the only thing that's going to impact us is if we see this war in Iran, and if we come to some type of an agreement, then the federal reserve would likely pause rates. They wouldn't do a thing. They wait for more evidence to come in more data collection. And then they'd make a decision at that point. But again, we are not there yet. Okay. Here's what I want to leave with. And again, this, this is something that I think everybody should be concerned with. If you are making good money, but yet all your money is going away because of expenses, because of your housing, your insurance, your food, your transportation, right? All those other things. The hardest part is that first off, how are you paying for all that stuff? Are you putting on credit cards using buy now, pay later? You borrowing money from other people. You're taking money from retirement. Okay. These are all things people do, but how are you paying for that? Because what we've seen is that wage growth has not actually surpassed inflation. Last month, inflation was what core was 3.7%. Okay. The unemployment rate was 4.1%. The annual wage growth, which we just got this past week is 3.1%. So inflation is taking over our wages. Our wage growth doesn't even account for inflation. That's the issue. So again, I'm bringing this to your attention because this is why so many people are so concerned. They have a job, but their job doesn't make them feel like they can do anything. They feel like they have no money. And it's because of inflation because prices keep going up. And it's not just on one thing. It's not just on food. It's not just on energy. It's not just on housing. It's across the board. That's the issue. So yes, inflation is somewhat cooling. It's not as hot as it once was, but it's still going up. It's still trending up, which is the wrong direction, which is why Americans are paying more for everything. And millions are wondering, well, when is the relief coming? So we'll see what happens, but just want to share that with you today because I know a lot of people are wondering, well, what does this mean? Are prices going up? Are they coming down? Is it going to cost us more money to use our credit cards? Well, you're going to find out soon enough because again, the Federal Reserve is going to meet on December 8th and 9th, and we're going to have a decision whether they keep rates where they're at or they raise rates. There's probably a 0% chance they're going to lower rates at this time. So we'll see what happens, but that's what we know as of today. So thank you guys for watching, consider subscribing, and I'll see you guys on the next one.