Prices at the wholesale level moved up slightly in June, the first hike in three months.

Thursday the U.S. Labor Department reported the Producer Price Index increased 0.1%, following drops of 0.4% in May and 0.2% in April.
“The accelerating economic recovery is beginning to push up inflation,” says Newport Communications Senior Economist Jim Haughey.
Core inflation, excluding food and energy, rose 0.2%, the biggest gain in many months. Prices for manufacturing materials rose 0.6% in June after a 0.5% rise in May. The overall index has been rising at a 1.5% annual pace year-to-date after declining during much of last year.
During June a 3.6% fall in crude material prices, mostly oil, was offset by a 2.6% surge in steel mill prices driven up by higher tariffs recently imposed on steel imports.
Haughey says so far the steel price increase has not appeared in the price indexes for trucks or trailers.
He notes less-than-truckload rates increased 1.7% in June and truckload rates were up 0.5%, both stronger gains than in recent months.
“LTL rates are now 5.3% higher than a year ago. Truckload rates are now 0.4% below a year ago, having recovered 75% of the early 2002 decline,” he says.
The Labor Department also reported Thursday that new claims for unemployment increased last week to a seasonally adjusted rate of 403,000 claims, the highest level since late May.