Consumer prices rose 2.4% annually in January, less than expected

CNBC (Business News) ^ | 13 February 2026 | Jeff Cox

[zeestephen]

The consumer price index was expected to increase 2.5% from a year ago in January, according to the Dow Jones consensus.

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TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS:

[dpetty121263]

The economy is slowing down just in time for the Mid Terms...

[OpusatFR]

Right in time for a rate cut.

[Vaduz]

Never noticed consumer prices ever to go down in the winter months.
It’s akin to gas prices going up when school is out and vacations starts.

Patterns don’t change much

[God luvs America]

LOL- what??

[abb]

unexpectedly!! burp...

[frogjerk]

I don’t understand your comment...you want more inflation?

[Pete Dovgan]

The Tariffs don’t seem to be driving inflation.
That’s because the driver of inflation is/was government spending and printing of money. Biden’s government based economy of printing and spending on illegals has been curtailed, so things are more stable.

The problems isn’t that the economy isn’t much better, or that inflation has dramatically been controlled, or that government revenue isn’t up with the Tariffs, or that we are inshoring jobs and increasing non-government payrolls, the problem is far worse. The problem is that the Media and the Democrats are trying to hide the reality of what they did, what it caused, and tell the public a lie about how much Trump has turned things around. The lies and false propaganda are the problem.

[dfwgator]

That’s why, tonight, I want you to try to look for in inflation, an entirely new word: Inflation is our friend.

For example, consider this: in the year 2000, if current trends continue, the average blue-collar annual wage in this country will be $568,000. Think what this inflated world of the future will mean – most Americans will be millionaires. Everyone will feel like a bigshot. Wouldn’t you like to own a $4,000 suit, and smoke a $75 cigar, drive a $600,000 car? I know I would! But what about people on fixed incomes? They have always been the true victims of inflation. That’s why I will present to Congress the “Inflation Maintenance Program”, whereby the U.S. Treasury will make up anyinflation-caused losses to direct tax rebates to the public in cash. Then you may say, “Won’t that cost a lot of money? Won’t that increase the deficit?” Sure it will! But so what? We’ll just print more money! We have the papers, we have the mints.. I can just call up the Bureau of Engraving and say, “Hi! This is Jimmy. Roll out some of them twenties! Print up a couple thousand sheets of those Century Notes!” Sure, all these dollars will cause even more inflation, but who cares? Everyone will be a millionaire!

[Opinionated Blowhard]

Last summer (and even as early as last February), the Dems were screaming “why hasn’t Trump reduced inflation already?” and the media was writing article after article about how inflation was Trump’s failure even though he was only in office a couple months. Then we got the scaremongering, including from the National Review types on the right, that tariffs were going to drive inflation up. Calmer people said wait a year to let Trump’s policies play out before making judgments on them. Now that Trump’s policies have had time to play out, the Dems and media have moved on to something else and we get the “unexpected” stories.

[escapefromboston]

Still too high but I guess it’s going in the right direction.

[Uncle Miltie]

Trump achieves Affordability!

[dangus]

Before the tariffs, economists were looking at a 2.5% inflation rate. They got 2.4%. There you have it after the 12th month. (Maybe we could wait for the 12th full month, February.) Infuriatingly, Trump sets the expectation for PRICES to go down, not INFLATION, so this only proves that he was correct, not that he’ll benefit from it. But hey, it’s still good news no matter how you slice it.

[Uncle Miltie]

Prices NEVER go down.

They may rise more or less slowly.

Until M2 actually declines, the printing presses are going full bore.

[Sir_Humphrey]

The Tariffs don't seem to be driving inflation.

That's because he waived over 200 of them.

[silverleaf]

I know!

Derp!

Look what Trump did now.
Biden gave us higher inflation.

[Old West Conservative]

dpetty121263 is merely a doomer.

No matter what good Trump does, it’s a failure.

No matter what improvements appear for the USA, dpetty121263 says it’s the last days of the Roman Empire

dpetty121263 is a Freeyore, I believe is the term.

[montag813]

Trump’s economy is absolutely perfect, but he saddled with this stupid fake Epstein “scandal” - by design.

[Capn Hayek]

Virtually all such data — the CPI, PPI, et al - are seasonally adjusted to correct around this. Somewhere in the report - they do provide a raw/unadjusted number, but nobody pays it much mind.

The same statistical model is used by many businesses for forecasting and projections — one nice thing about government data models; they can’t be copyrighted, they are transparent (if one understands statistics!), and are readily reused.

Of course, larger companies with the capital to hire their own statisticians (and investment banks especially) develop their own models... but those are usually developed against more niche areas (a toy manufacturer wants a more specific model more sensitive to say, holiday shopping, than say... a turkey farm which might instead want to weight against Thanksgiving dinners).

[daler]

And all legacy media reporting on this will be followed by the word “however…”