October’s US consumer price index (CPI) is due on Tuesday 10 November at 08:30 ET, in what will be the last inflation reading before the Federal Reserve’s 8–9 December decision.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expect headline CPI to rise 0.3 percent month on month, with core CPI — which excludes food and energy — up 0.2 percent.
No year-on-year figure this time
There will be no official year-on-year figure this time. October 2025 prices were never collected during the government shutdown, so the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) cannot publish a twelve-month comparison.
That matters because some outlets are still quoting year-on-year forecasts of 3.6 to 3.9 percent. Those are NOT official BLS figures, and must not be presented as such. Any year-on-year number used must be clearly labelled as a private forecast, not a BLS release.
September’s CPI, the last full reading, was up 0.6 percent headline month on month, with inflation at 3.7 percent year on year and core up 0.3 percent month on month.
A December hike is now priced in
Tuesday’s number lands in a changed market. After Friday’s jobs report beat expectations — 165,000 jobs added, with unemployment at 4.1 percent — traders now price about an 80 percent chance of a December rate hike by the Fed.
That is a sharp shift from earlier in the autumn, when a cut was the base case. A hotter-than-expected CPI on Tuesday would strengthen the case for a hike at the 8–9 December meeting; a softer reading could revive the argument for holding rates.
For households, the stakes are direct: the CPI feeds into the cost of living, into wage negotiations and into the interest rates on mortgages, credit cards and car loans. Tuesday’s release will be read in Washington, on Wall Street and in every kitchen table budget in America.
