The Federal Reserve Board is set to make an announcement on interest rates today, and nearly everyone on Wall Street and in the White House is drueling for an interest rate cut now that the Biden inflation dragon has been allegedly slayed

Hold on. Are we the only ones keeping an eye on commodity prices?

Our favorite lead indicator of inflation is the CRB index, a real-time gauge of commodity prices – which measures everything from oil to gold to food to copper price changes. In the last six weeks, commodity prices are UP nearly 7%. Admittedly, that comes in the wake of the index hitting a three-year low in early December.

Whether this is a “transitory” blip, or a longer-term trend of rising prices is unknowable right now. But if the Fed wants to stop the bleeding and get back to its 2% inflation target, now doesn’t seem to be a prudent time to be adding more liquidity into the economy.