Underlying, monthly (note the emphasis) inflation was cooler than expected across the world’s largest economy in April, the BEA said Thursday.

Core price growth on the Fed’s preferred metric rose just 0.239% from March, this week’s marquee US macro release showed.

That counts as the slowest monthly pace since November. Economists expected a 0.3% MoM gain. The YoY pace, though, accelerated to 3.3%, in line with estimates and the fastest since late 2023.

Headline PCE prices likewise undershot estimates on a MoM basis, rising 0.4% against an expected 0.5% advance. The YoY pace, 3.8%, was the briskest in nearly three years.

Notably, so-called “supercore” prices — i.e., core services price growth excluding housing, a measure the Fed watches for signs of “problematic” inflation — rose just 0.1% MoM. But the YoY pace was uncomfortable there too, at 3.5%.

On the spending side, consumers kept up appearances, but just barely. Nominal spending matched estimates with a respectable 0.5% gain, but real personal spending managed a meager 0.1% advance, a third of March’s pace.

As the figure shows, the saving rate fell sharply to just 2.6% in April, tied for the second-lowest of the post-pandemic era and among the lowest prints on record in data back to 1959 if you exclude the lead-up to the GFC.

Inflation-adjusted disposable income fell 0.5%. April marked the third consecutive monthly decline on that metric. It’s been negative in eight of the personal income and spending reports released since Donald Trump took office for the second time.

The figures come on the heels of the worst-ever University of Michigan consumer sentiment poll and a Conference Board survey which suggested more than two-thirds of American families are “cutting back on spending overall” as a result of higher prices, most notably at the pump.

As the figure reminds you, the average of the two main household mood surveys sits near a record low.

The price change in the PCE line item for “gasoline and other energy goods” was 5.5% in April, Thursday’s BEA report showed, marking a dubious encore from the prior month’s 21% increase.

On Wednesday, during a cabinet meeting, Trump said of the Iranians, “They thought they were gonna out-wait me. You know, ‘He’s got the midterms.’ But I don’t care about the midterms.”