October CPI Rose 0.4%, Core 0.3% — With No 12-Month Rate

October CPI 2026: headline 0.4%, core 0.3% — no 12-month rate

October CPI 2026: the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ October Consumer Price Index printed seasonally adjusted all-items +0.4% and core (all items less food and energy) a published +0.3%. Pre-print estimates differed by source and are not a single blended consensus: FactSet (via Morningstar) had 0.2% headline and 0.2% core; Dow Jones (via CNBC) had 0.3% headline and 0.2% core. It is the last scheduled CPI before the Dec. 8–9 FOMC — and, unusually, BLS published no 12-month change for headline or core.

The official 1-decimal figures match the unrounded math on the seasonally adjusted indexes. Headline CPI-U (CUSR0000SA0) went from 336.298 to 337.476, or +0.350%, which rounds to the published +0.4%. Core (CUSR0000SA0L1E) went from 338.896 to 339.900, or +0.296%, which rounds to the published +0.3%. August and September core were +0.290% and +0.335% — three consecutive months that publish as 0.3%.

What moved: energy, shelter, and a used-car offset

On the official seasonally adjusted, one-decimal Table 1 column, energy rose +0.7%, gasoline (all types) +1.0%, food +0.5%, shelter +0.3%, transportation services +0.8%, airline fares +0.4%, new vehicles +0.2%, and apparel +0.1%. Used cars and trucks fell −1.2%. Medical care commodities also rose +0.5%. Those official rounded figures match the unrounded API indexes and the component list carried on CNBC.

Morningstar (Lauren Solberg, Nov. 10), in a third-party recap, also broke out the energy move after energy rose 5.2% in September: electricity +0.9%, fuel oil +2.0%, and utility gas −0.8%, with gasoline +1.0% — alongside the official Table 1 energy rise of +0.7%.

Business Insider wrote that shelter accounted for more than 30% of the 0.4% increase. Our arithmetic, using BLS Table 1’s September 2026 relative importance for shelter (35.238) times the unrounded shelter rise of +0.3047%, is a +0.107 percentage-point contribution, or about 30.7% of the unrounded headline increase of +0.3503%. That is our calculation on official ingredients, not a BLS-published contribution line.

October core’s published +0.3% (exactly +0.296%) sits at the “around 0.3 percent or even higher” line Governor Christopher J. Waller set overnight. That is a fact about where the print landed, not a forecast of what the Committee will do in December.

How to read a CPI print with no 12-month figure

CPI measures prices paid by urban consumers. The monthly news release usually highlights seasonally adjusted one-month changes and not-seasonally-adjusted 12-month changes for all items and for core, built from the Commodities and Services Pricing Survey and the Housing Survey. This month is different. October 2025 all-items and core indexes were never published, so there is no official 12-month rate for those aggregates. BLS Table 1 states: “The Oct 2025 data values are not available due to the 2025 lapse in appropriations.”

Some narrower series that do have an October 2025 index still show a 12-month change. Gasoline-only, not seasonally adjusted (NSA), is up 37.4% from a year earlier (CUUR0000SETB01). That is a gasoline-only NSA 12-month change, not an all-items or core inflation rate, and not a substitute for the missing official headline or core annual figures.

Without those official 12-month aggregates, the usable picture is the month-to-month print, the component list, and shorter annualized rates — FatTail’s own arithmetic, not official BLS 12-month rates. Using that method, ((P_t / P_t−n)^(12/n) − 1) × 100 on the seasonally adjusted headline and core indexes, the rates through October are: 3-month headline 5.72% and core 3.75%; 6-month headline 3.07% and core 2.69%. Including October raised the 3-month rates from September’s 4.56% / 3.41%; the 6-month rates eased slightly from 3.67% / 2.85% as April rolled off. More on reading the calendar: economic reports · FOMC meeting schedule 2026.

Into Dec. 9: the last scheduled CPI

November’s CPI does not arrive until Dec. 10, after the meeting. Between now and then: October PPI on Nov. 13, October PCE on Nov. 25, and the Employment Situation on Dec. 4. Kevin Warsh has chaired the FOMC since May 22, 2026. A Reuters poll of 101 economists, conducted Nov. 6–10 — a window that includes days before this print — found all 101 expecting a 25 bp December hike to 4.00%–4.25%; 56 of 101 expected that to be the last hike of the cycle, and 45 expected at least two more. That survey is not a post-print poll.

RateWatch prices the Dec. 9 meeting at 100% hike / 0% hold, with +25 bp 90.8% and +50 bp 9.2%, as of 2026-11-11 09:11:36 EST. Live board: RateWatch. That is a single snapshot, not a path from an earlier reading. A WSJ live blog at 8:50 AM ET (Rebecca Feng) said traders were pricing a roughly 10% chance of a 50 bp hike; that is a third-party traders’ figure, not a RateWatch stamp. Related reading: December Fed meeting 2026 · RateWatch December decision · inflation expectations 2026.

The S&P 500 was near 7,504.81 as of 9:52 AM ET Tuesday. VIX1D was near 13.83 as of 9:51 AM ET Tuesday. VIX was near 20.83 as of 9:52 AM ET Tuesday (Massive index snapshots, regular session). Official daily Treasury yields in the Massive feed still run only through Nov. 6 (2-year 4.51%, 10-year 4.86%) and are lagged. WSJ described Treasury yields moving higher and stock futures lower after the print; that is WSJ’s wording, not a FatTail causal claim.

What it means for 0DTE

• Energy: A scheduled 8:30 AM ET CPI event, with the surprise in the official month-to-month print (headline +0.4%, core +0.3%) and no official y/y headline for coverage to anchor on. Futures repriced first; cash opens already reflecting that m/m surprise.
• Premium: Tuesday’s VIX1D is the session that covers this print. Monday’s close does not.
• Structure: Defined risk only. Core sitting at a stated 0.3% line is a mapping fact, not a Committee call, and we have no owned CPI-day range statistics to lean on.
• Plan, don’t predict: Keep the official +0.4% / +0.3% (and the unrounded +0.350% / +0.296%), the missing annual rate, and RateWatch’s single 9:11 AM ET snapshot next to the live tape. Checklist: 0DTE SPX scenario guide.

Related reading: Economic reports · FOMC meeting schedule 2026 · RateWatch · FOMC Alerts hub

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