Wholesale price inflation rose more quickly than economists’ estimates in January, reinforcing concerns of above-target inflation, figures released Friday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) show.

The producer price index (PPI), which tracks inflation across the U.S. supply chain, rose 0.5% from December across all categories on a seasonally adjusted basis, landing 2.9% higher on an unadjusted yearly basis in January.

The PPI gained a revised 0.4% from November to December and 0.2% from October to November.

Inflation across core PPI, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, increased a seasonally adjusted 0.8% last month. That exceeded the 0.3% forecast among economists surveyed by Dow Jones, and it represents a faster rate of increase than December’s 0.6% growth.

The 3.4% annual pace of core PPI inflation in January was down slightly from 3.5% annual growth in November and December.

Last month’s increase was fueled by a 0.8% monthly gain in wholesale services prices, according to BLS data, exceeding the 0.7% gain posted in December and extending months of steadily rising supply-chain services inflation since last summer.

Wholesale goods inflation declined 0.3% in January, however, the largest drop since a 0.7% decline last March.

“Most of the January rise in prices for final demand services can be traced to margins for final demand trade services, which jumped 2.5%,” said the BLS. More specifically, the report attributed more than 20% of that increase to a 14.4% spike in “margins for professional and commercial equipment wholesaling.”

Meanwhile, almost 80% of the drop in wholesale goods prices across the all-items index was attributable to a 5.5% decline in the gasoline index. “Conversely, the index for search, detection, navigation, and guidance systems jumped 15.5%,” the BLS said.

The Supreme Court recently struck down the legality of many of President Donald Trump’s signature tariffs, casting doubt on the direction of U.S. monetary policy in 2026. Upward price pressures linked to cost increases from tariffs on U.S. businesses and consumers have consistently been cited by the Federal Reserve as keeping inflation elevated.