As US consumer inflation rose to a 40-year high in January, many financial watchers expect the US Federal Reserve to take a more hawkish stance this year to tame red-hot commodity prices and ease the financial pressure on American companies and their profitability.
Uncertainty over the impact of surging costs and the inflation trajectory has weighed on markets in the US and overseas, but some consumer companies in the US are taking advantage of this scenario to hike output costs — in levels not seen in nearly two decades since IHS Markit started tracking private-sector activity — in a bid to bolster profit margins.
