Consumer prices rose by 4.2% in annual terms in October, leaping from a 3.1% increase in September. Both the BoE and a Reuters poll of economists - none of whom had predicted such a big increase - had pointed to a reading of 3.9%.
The consumer price index rose 0.9% last month after gaining 0.4% in September, the Labor Department said on Wednesday. In the 12 months through October, the CPI accelerated 6.2%. That was the largest year-on-year advance since November 1990 and followed a 5.4% jump in September.
Underlying U.S. consumer prices increased at their slowest pace in six months in August as used motor vehicle prices tumbled, suggesting that inflation had probably peaked, though it could remain high for a while amid persistent supply constraints.
El Salvador on Tuesday became the first country to adopt bitcoin as legal tender, a real-world experiment proponents say will lower commission costs for billions of dollars sent from abroad but which critics warned may fuel money laundering.
Musk’s comments at the B Word conference come after Tesla said in May it would stop accepting bitcoin for car purchases, less than two months after the company began accepting the world’s biggest digital currency for payment.
The latest growth forecast by the Taipei-based think tank was 1.07 percentage points higher than its prediction late last year of a 3.73 percent increase for 2021.
The seasonally adjusted rate was lower than those of many other countries, including Canada (9.4 percent), Hong Kong (7.0 percent), the United States (6.3 percent) and South Korea (5.4 percent), the data showed.
The Biden administration issued a statement Tuesday announcing that the mortgage forbearance and foreclosure protection programs will be extended through June 30. The protections were due to expire on March 31.
