This morning's object of suspense was a set of numbers, scheduled for release at precisely 8:30 a.m. Eastern: the Consumer Price Index. In a country where consumer confidence can oscillate on the basis of a Fed chair's eyebrow raise, the CPI is both talisman and threat. Economists expected July's “core” inflation to clock in at three percent—steady enough, perhaps, to justify the widely anticipated quarter-point interest-rate cut in September, but high enough to make the Federal Reserve flinch. However, the reading came in slightly above.