Evelyn Reynolds

Retail sales slipped 0.9% for the month from an upwardly revised 0.7% gain in December, worse than the Dow Jones estimate for a 0.2% decline.
Excluding autos, prices fell 0.4%, also well off the consensus forecast for a 0.3% increase, while the “control” sales group slid 0.8%.
Import prices accelerated 0.3% in January, in line with expectations for the largest one-month move since April 2024.

Consumers sharply curtailed their spending in January, indicating a potential weakening in economic growth ahead, according to a Commerce Department report Friday.
Retail sales slipped 0.9% for the month from an upwardly revised 0.7% gain in December, even worse than the Dow Jones estimate for a 0.2% decline. The sales totals are adjusted for seasonality but not inflation for a month, in which prices rose 0.5%.

Excluding autos, prices fell 0.4%, also well off the consensus forecast for a 0.3% increase. A “control” measure that strips out several nonessential categories and figures directly into calculations for gross domestic product fell 0.8% after an upwardly revised increase of 0.8%.
With consumer spending making up about two-thirds of all economic activity in the U.S., the sales numbers indicate a potential weakening in growth for the first quarter.
Receipts at sporting goods, music and book stores tumbled 4.6% on the month, while online outlets reported a 1.9% decline and motor vehicles and parts spending dropped 2.8%. Gas stations along with food and drinking establishments both reported 0.9% increases.
Stock market futures held in slightly negative territory following the release, while Treasury yields lost ground. Traders raised bets that the Federal Reserve could cut interest rates again as soon as June.
“The drop was dramatic, but several mitigating factors show there’s no cause for alarm. Some of it can be chalked up to bad weather, and some to auto sales tanking in January after an unusual surge in December due to fat dealer incentives,” said Robert Frick, corporate economist with Navy Federal Credit Union. “Especially considering December was revised up strongly, the rolling average of consumer spending remains solid,” Frick added.

Inflation remains ahead of the Fed’s 2% goal. The consumer price index posted a 0.5% gain in January and showed a 3% annual inflation rate. However, the producer price index, a proxy for wholesale prices, showed some softening in key pipeline inputs.
In other economic news Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that import prices accelerated 0.3% in January, in line with expectations for the largest one-month move since April 2024. On a year-over-year basis, import prices increased 1.9%.
Fuel prices increased 3.2% on the month, also the biggest gain since April 2024. Food, feeds and beverage costs rose 0.2% following a 3% surge in December.
Export prices also increased, rising 1.3%. More

Defense stocks dropped sharply Thursday afternoon after President Donald Trump suggested the U.S. could massively cut defense spending.
Trump has sent mixed messages on military spending throughout his 2024 campaign and in the early days of his presidency.

U.S. President Donald Trump sits in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Feb. 13, 2025.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters

Defense stocks dropped sharply Thursday afternoon after President Donald Trump suggested the U.S. could massively cut defense spending.
Trump said Thursday at the White House the U.S. could cut defense spending in half at some point in the future. The comments came in the context of Trump discussing a potential conference on defense spending with China and Russia.

“At some point, when things settle down, I’m going to meet with China and I’m going to meet with Russia, in particular those two, and I’m going to say there’s no reason for us to be spending almost $1 trillion on the military … and I’m going to say we can spend this on other things,” Trump said.
“When we straighten it all out, then one of the first meetings I want to have is with President Xi of China and President Putin of Russia, and I want to say let’s cut our military budget in half. And we can do that, and I think we’ll be able to do that,” he added.
Defense stocks that had been higher earlier in the day quickly fell. Shares of Lockheed Martin dropped 1.6%, Northrop Grumman sank 3.4% and General Dynamics lost 2.1%.
Trump has sent mixed messages on military spending throughout his 2024 campaign and in the early days of his presidency.
On one hand, Trump has enlisted Elon Musk and the so-called Department of Government Efficiency to find places to cut costs throughout the government. Trump has also pushed for a quick resolution of the war in Ukraine, which has involved the purchase of a lot of American weapons.

On the other hand, he has touted the importance of having a strong military and signed an executive order to explore building an “Iron Dome of America” missile defense system. Trump also said Thursday that the U.S. has the “greatest military equipment in the world.”
“Right now, people are confused by a number of different crosscurrents” on defense spending, TD Cowen policy analyst Roman Schweizer told CNBC last week.

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The producer price index increased by a seasonally adjusted 0.4% on the month, compared with the Dow Jones estimate for 0.3%.
Stock market futures moved slightly higher following the release while Treasury yields fell. Wall Street strategists cited details of the report that suggested a slightly more benign inflation picture.

A gauge of wholesale prices rose more than expected in January, though some details of the report indicated that pipeline inflation pressures are easing.
The producer price index, which measures what producers get for their goods and services, increased by a seasonally adjusted 0.4% on the month, compared with the Dow Jones estimate for 0.3%, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday.

Excluding food and energy, the core PPI was up 0.3%, in line with the forecast.
Stock market futures moved higher following the release while Treasury yields were sharply lower, despite the higher-than-expected headline number. Wall Street strategists cited details of the report that suggested a slightly more benign inflation picture.
In particular, some costs related to health care showed easing — physician care, for instance, fell 0.5%. Also, domestic airfares declined by 0.3% and brokerage services prices were off 2.2%.
Over the past year, the all-items PPI increased 3.5%, well ahead of the central bank’s objective. Futures pricing indicates the market now does not expect the Fed to lower its benchmark interest rate again until October.
While the producer and consumer price index releases are widely cited inflation gauges, they are not the principal ones the Fed uses. Rather, the central bank focuses on the personal consumption expenditures prices index, which the Commerce Department will release later in February. The PPI and CPI releases do feed into that measure.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell on Wednesday noted the Fed’s greater focus on the PCE measure, while telling the House Financial Services Committee that “we’re not quite there yet” on inflation though he cited “great progress” made so far.
Putting the data together, the core PCE measure likely will show a 0.22% increase, down from 0.45% in December, according to Citigroup estimates. That would push the annual inflation rate down to 2.5%, the firm said.
The PPI release comes the day after the BLS reported that the consumer price index rose 0.5% on the month, putting the annual inflation rate at 3% and well out of reach of the Fed’s 2% long-run goal.
Together, the reports are pushing back expectations for a rate cut until the second half of the year, though inflation data can be volatile and the outlook could change depending on what subsequent months show.
“Wholesale price growth came in slightly higher than expected for January, and the read for December was adjusted upward,” said Elizabeth Renter, senior economist at personal finance site NerdWallet. “In other words, inflation at the producer level remains high, and one concern is that this inflation could ultimately be passed along to consumers.”
Revisions to the December numbers also complicated the inflation picture, with the gain now put at 0.5%, compared with the 0.2% increase previously reported.
In January, producer prices for services increased 0.3% while goods rose 0.6%. Services prices were led by a 5.7% jump in the traveler accommodation services category, which the BLS said accounted for more than one-third of the gain.
On the goods side, a 10.4% surge in diesel fuel costs was a significant factor. The PPI data also reflected the massive jump in egg prices as farmers destroy millions of chickens to prevent the spread of avian flu. Eggs for fresh use exploded 44% higher on the month and were up 186.4% from a year ago.
In other economic news Thursday, the Labor Department reported that initial filings for unemployment claims changed little for the week ended Feb. 8. Claims totaled 213,000, a decrease of 7,000 from the prior period and close to the 215,000 estimate. Continuing claims, which run a week behind, fell to 1.85 million, down 36,000.

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Hedge fund titan Ray Dalio issued a fresh warning about the U.S. economy, warning of dire consequences if debt is not significantly cut.
He stressed that governments are responsible, and that leaders should make a pledge to reduce the U.S. budget deficit from 7.5% to 3% of gross domestic product or resign.
U.S. gross national debt stood at approximately $36.22 trillion as of Feb. 11.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Hedge fund titan Ray Dalio issued a fresh warning about the U.S. economy, warning of dire consequences if the Trump administration does not cut the country’s debt.
“It’s like if I was a doctor and I was speaking with you about your condition, I would say to you, this is now very, very serious. All of these are major problems,” Dalio told CNBC’s Dan Murphy at the World Governments Summit in Dubai. “What you need to do is cut your deficit from about seven and a half percent of GDP to 3% of gross domestic product, and you can do that. There are certain things that you can do that cut it in a certain way that’ll make it much healthier, so the real problem is a political problem.”

The U.S. gross national debt stood at approximately $36.22 trillion as of Feb. 11, with $28.8 trillion of that as debt held by the public in the form of securities owned by individuals, corporations, state or local governments, Federal Reserve banks, foreign governments, and other entities outside the U.S. government. 
High debt means the government spends more on interest payments and is more economically vulnerable in the event of future economic crises. It also leads to higher inflation and creates a burden for future generations.

“I want to alert people. I want to alert government officials,” the billionaire Bridgewater Associates founder said. “I want to help, you know, and so I feel like the doctor, and then I would say everybody, politically … if this doesn’t happen, and we have the equivalent of, you know, an economic heart attack, or a heart attack of the bond market, then you know who’s responsible, because it can happen.”
“So it requires the same kind of discipline as if I was to say to you, OK, you need to change how you eat, you need to change your exercise routine, and you need to do these things.”
Dalio stressed that governments are responsible, and that leaders should make a pledge to reduce the U.S. budget deficit from 7.5% to 3% of its GDP or resign.

When asked what his message was to the Trump administration, Dalio replied:
“I think they recognize the problem, and then in the actions that are being taken, how do you cut costs? How do you raise productivity? … Make sure that you really know what you’re doing and you’re practical, and do it on … the conservative side, because you know, how much can the cutting actually be? We’ll see, and what are the consequences of the cutting and each one of those. So you better take a sharp pencil and be conservative.”
Dalio also warned of debt in private credit, saying a “debt death spiral is that part of the cycle, when the debtor needs to borrow money in order to pay debt service, and it accelerates, and then everybody sees that, and they don’t want to hold the debt. That’s where we’re approaching.”
Dalio’s Bridgewater Associates is one of the world’s largest hedge funds. It had $171.7 billion in assets under management as of September 2023, according to the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission. More