numbers it is so interesting that we ve seen the market come down, but on the economic front producer prices unexpectedly dropped between january and february. also on an annual basis it cooled off to 4.6%. if you look at the chart, this is a major improvement from early last year when this metric was nearly 12%. we ve seen eight months in a row of cooling off. less encouraging were some of the retail sales numbers out. that showed that american shopping slowed down a bit between january and february. retail sales fell by .4%. that s significant because, remember, consumer spending, that s the biggest driver of the u.s. economy and i should note that comes after a big increase in january. now the question is what is the federal reserve going to do with all of this because we ve got inflation cooling off, consumer spending taking a dip and all of this pressure on the banking system. i mean, it shows how difficult it is to get a soft landing, right? to get it perfectly right,
families build up from covid will wind down and they are relying on their credit cards more. but what is interesting, things are resilient in the economy. we saw the retail sales numbers that were just blockbuster. they are worried about the future. and one other reason they are worried. good news for main street is bad news for wall street. and the fed will probably raise the interest rates for longer and they can because it s consumer strong. we are in this funny, confusing moment. home depot raising pay. that shows the tight labor market. they already start at $15 an hour, and they don t want to lose people. the biggest fear is not what is down the pike but holding on to workers. they have choices and they will
good news for retailers is bad news for investors today. the dow is down. look at that, about 72 points right now, after news today that retail sales numbers rose 3% in january. this comes on the heels of rising consumer prices and a strong jobs report. it means the economy is not cooling off. vanessa is live in new york to break down the numbers for us. hey, vanessa. hey, kasie. so this is another economic report that is defying expectations. this is retail sales for the month of january, up 3%. and that is significant because retail sales fell by 0.1% in december. and the big numbers to keep in mind, that 3% in january and then up 6.4% year over year.
restrictive territory. the very goal of these higher rates is to slow down economic activity. and we saw that in the u.s. with the latest retail sales numbers, which were down. we know that the consumer is starting to get exhausted. even though it might be christmas, if we look into 2023, i m afraid the economic omens are not that good. richard quest, cnn, new york. british nurses walked off the job for the day on thursday with as many as 100,000 members of the uk s largest nurse s union participating in the historic strike. the nurses want a pay raise that s 5% above the inflation rate. a total of 19% hike. they also say they re calling attention to the crisis in the country s national health care service after years of falling pay and declining standards.
declare a state of emergency. important distinction there. rosa flores reporting. thank you so much. well, there are some stunning new allegations in the final installments of the harry and meghan documentary. including sibling confrontations and accusations of planting stories and gaslighting. so how are the royals responding? and let s take a look at stocks now, down sharply after new retail sales numbers show consumer spending plummeted last month. what this says about the state of the economy. that s ahead. d give it a try. it was easy. i inputted information about the car including, the e mileage, the vin number. answered a few questions a and got a real offer in seconds. it felt too good to be true. it was a lot higherr than i expected. a carvana advocate came to my house. as soon as they stepped in the car they paid me on the spot. i couldn t believe it. i d recommend it to anyone. try it for yourself. go to carvana .com and get an offer for your car. at carvana