JM News UK

U.S. consumer prices increased for a second straight month in March on rising gasoline and housing costs, a sign of an uptick in inflation that should keep the Federal Reserve on course to start raising interest rates this year. March's broad-based price gains bolster the U.S. central bank's long-held view that inflation will gradually move towards its 2 percent target as the dampening effect of lower energy prices fades. "The data should allay the disinflation concerns that predominated earlier this year and, on the margin, increase the Fed's confidence that inflation will eventually move toward its target," said Michelle Girard, chief economist at RBS in Stamford, Connecticut. In the 12 months through March, the CPI slipped 0.1 percent after being unchanged in February.