The Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation, the personal consumption expenditures index, grew less than economists expected in August, at 2.2% year over year . The data comes on the heels of the Federal Reserve’s 50-basis-point interest rate cut issued Sept. 18, the first in more than four years .
The inflation data supports another 50-basis-point cut in November in the interest rate banks charge each other to borrow money, Joseph Brusuelas, chief economist at the professional services firm RSM US LLP, said in a Friday tweet. “This is what an economic expansion looks like at full employment,” he said .
Also in the week , the S&P 500 traded at all-time highs, above the 5,700 level.
Talk in Detroit turns to Chinese tech ban
Economist Lael Brainard, the director of the National Economic Council and a former Federal Reserve board member, spoke Monday at the Detroit Economic Club in favor of a Biden administration proposal to ban Chinese software and hardware in connected vehicles on U.S. roads. Brainard's comments came the same day the details of the proposal were released.
The U.S. Commerce Department aims to block the import and sale of Chinese-made vehicles with key communications and automated driving systems on the basis of national security concerns. Additionally, a 100% tariff on Chinese electric vehicles imposed by the Biden administration took effect Friday.
“We will not allow cars driving on U.S. roads if they are using Chinese software and hardware systems,” Brainard told the DEC . “We think this is very important from a national security point of view.”
Meta dives deeper into AR/VR
Meta Platforms announced its latest Quest 3S virtual reality headset at the Meta Connect 2024 conference Wednesday in Menlo Park, California. Facebook's parent company also announced updates to its open source generative AI platform, Llama, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg introduced a prototype for Orion, Meta’s holographic augmented reality glasses .
“A lot of the stuff we’ve been talking about for a long time, glasses, mixed reality, AI, it’s happening. And we can start to see how the future of computing and the future of human connection are going to look, and it’s pretty awesome,” Zuckerberg said.
China stimulus triggers stock rally
The People’s Bank of China announced stimulus measures that will inject approximately 1 trillion yuan ($140 billion) in liquidity into the country’s banking system and also announced a reduction in the mortgage rate, sending U.S.-traded China stocks and ETFs, such as e-commerce giant Alibaba Group and electric vehicle manufacturer Nio, higher.
Billionaire hedge fund manager David Tepper told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that he’s building positions in Chinese stocks . “I didn’t know that they were going to bring out the big guns,” Tepper of the country’s stimulus plans.
More: The Fed's bold move on interest rates has ripple effects, plus GM makes a bold move, too
Novo Nordisk grilled over weight loss drug cost
Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Jorgensen faced questions from the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on Tuesday about the high prices of the drugs Ozempic and Wegovy. Wegovy, the weight loss version of diabetes drug Ozempic, costs $1,349 monthly in the U.S. versus $186 in Denmark, $140 in Germany and $92 in the United Kingdom, according to the committee.
“You’re making huge amounts of money in this country and you’re charging us far more and you haven’t given me an answer as to why,” U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont and the committee’s chair, said to Jorgensen during the hearing.
The CEO said: “Anything that will help patients get access to affordable medicine, we’ll be happy to look into.”
Benzinga is a financial news and data company headquartered in Detroit.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Another big Fed interest rate cut coming? One economist says yes
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