Producer Price Index (PPI) inflation data will be released on Wednesday, no doubt overshadowed by the better-known Consumer Prices Index (CPI) release.
But it deserves a closer look. PPI measures changes in the prices of goods bought and sold by UK manufacturers, and is divided into an input price index and an output price index. While the input price index measures changes in the price of materials bought by UK manufacturers for processing, the output price index measures the change in factory gate prices.
As such, the PPI can be a valuable leading indicator of inflation: rising costs at a wholesale level result in consumers paying more for finished goods, meaning higher CPI inflation later on. Encouragingly, recent figures show rapidly falling PPI, fuelling hopes that CPI will follow.
Monday 14 August
China: FDI
Tuesday 15 August
China: Industrial output, retail sales
Japan: Q2 GDP preliminary, industrial production, retail sales
UK: Claimant count, employment, unemployment, average weekly earnings
US: Export price, import price, Empire State Index, retail sales, business inventories, NAHB housing market index
Wednesday 16 August
Euro area: Q2 GDP (second estimate), industrial production, trade balance
UK: Inflation, PPI inflation, RPI inflation, ONS HPI
US: Building permits, housing completions, housing starts, capacity utilisation, industrial production, manufacturing production, FOMC minutes
Thursday 17 August
Japan: Trade balance, core machinery orders
US: Philadelphia Fed index, leading indicators
Friday 18 August
Euro area: Inflation
Japan: Inflation
UK: Retail sales
