Stock market takes big dip following August inflation report

Trader in NYSE
(Image credit: Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

It was a bad day on Wall Street.

Stocks took a big dip on Tuesday in the wake of a new consumer-price report, which saw inflation jump more than expected in the month of August (even with a drop in gas prices), The Wall Street Journal reports.

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The Tuesday inflation numbers also arrived just ahead of next week's Federal Reserve meeting, "where the central bank is expected to deliver its third consecutive 0.75 percentage point interest rate hike to tamp down inflation," CNBC writes.

Though the August data suggests inflation is easing, the cooling is "at a slower pace than investors and economists had anticipated," the Journal adds. Economists that spoke with the Journal had expected prices to rise 8 percent annually in August, rather than 8.3 percent; still, last month's reading is down from the red-hot ratings from both July and June, which saw an 8.5 percent and a 9.1 percent annual rise in prices, respectively.

Brigid Kennedy

Brigid Kennedy worked at The Week from 2021 to 2023 as a staff writer, junior editor and then story editor, with an interest in U.S. politics, the economy and the music industry.