Market Brief, North America

Underlying consumer price growth held relatively steady in the United States last month, and initial jobless claims jumped last week, giving the Federal Reserve room—and motivation—to cut at next week’s meeting. According to data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics this morning, the core consumer price index—with highly-volatile food and energy prices excluded—rose 0.35 percent in August, marking its highest level since January, and climbed 3.1 percent over the same period last year. This is broadly in line with consensus estimates among economists polled by the major data providers ahead of the release, but looks slightly more worrisome when...

Optimism is rippling across the financial markets and US equity futures are setting up for another strong open after Oracle Corp. said its contract backlog exploded by a staggering 359 percent to $455 billion in its first quarter, underscoring the sheer scale of the ongoing buildout of artificial intelligence infrastructure. By our estimates, the top ten AI-focused companies listed on US exchanges have collectively invested approximately $383 billion in capital expenditures over the past four quarters—equivalent to nearly 1.3 percent of gross domestic product—and are poised to commit at least another $475 billion over the coming year, providing a powerful...