Producer prices shot up 6%, adding to pressure on companies to raise prices for customers

Customers shop in the produce section of a grocery store on Monday, May 11, 2026, in Portland, Ore. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane)

2026-05-13T12:41:51Z

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. wholesale inflation came in hot last month. Producer prices rose 6% from a year earlier, most since December 2022, as the 10-week Iran war pushed up energy prices and put pressure on companies to pass along higher costs to consumers.

The Labor Department reported Wednesday that its producer price index — which tracks inflation before it hits consumers — shot up 1.4% in April, biggest monthly gain since March 2022.

The numbers were much higher than economists had forecast.

Wholesale prices can offer an early look at where consumer inflation might be headed. Economists also watch it because some of its components, notably measures of health care and financial services, flow into the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge — the Commerce Department’s personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, price index.

On Tuesday, the Labor Department said that its closely watched consumer price index jumped 3.8% last month from April 2025 — the biggest year-over-year increase in more than three years — as energy prices continued to climb.

Prices are rising at time when Americans are already frustrated by the high cost of living. Affordability is likely to be a key issue when voters go to the polls Nov. 3 to determine whether President Donald Trump’s Republican Party maintains control of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.