Full text of U.S. Financial Data : May 13, 1999

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May 13, 1999

USFinancialData
THE WEEK'S HIGHLIGHTS:
The producer price index (PPI) for finished goods rose 0.5 percent
in April, or at a 5.6 percent annual rate. April’s PPI inflation rate
was boosted by a 5.1 percent (not annualized) jump in energy
prices, the largest one-month rise since October 1990. Excluding
energy prices, however, the PPI actually fell at a 2.5 percent rate
in April. Measured from a year earlier, the PPI is up 1.1 percent.
The nominal value of retail sales rose $0.2 billion in April, or
0.9 percent at an annual rate. Sales in April, which followed
an even weaker 0.8 percent gain in March, were boosted by a
2.4 percent (not annualized) increase in sales at gasoline stations.
Excluding gasoline sales, retail sales fell at a 0.7 percent rate
in April.
Following a 4.3 percent rise during the fourth quarter of 1998,
output per hour (productivity) in the nonfarm business sector grew
at a 4 percent annual rate during the first quarter. Unit labor
costs, accordingly, which measure compensation costs adjusted for
productivity, rose at just a 0.3 percent rate during the first quarter.
Nonfarm productivity is up 2.8 percent from four quarters earlier,
with unit labor costs up 1.3 percent.
The index of U.S. import prices rose at a 9.7 percent annual rate in
April, the third rise in the past four months and the largest since
September 1996. Prices of nonpetroleum imports, however, fell at a
3.8 percent rate in April and are down 2.4 percent from a year earlier.

All data are seasonally adjusted unless otherwise indicated.
U.S. Financial Data is published weekly by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of
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