The Goldilocks US Inflation and Spending Data Are an Illusion

Thursday’s US data dump cheered financial markets up: Inflation fell from a month earlier and the “core” measure — which strips out food and energy — was softer than expected. Consumption data separately showed an economy firing on all cylinders: booming AI investment alongside free-spending consumers. Don’t expect these too-good-to-be-true goldilocks optics to last very long.