The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics still plans to release the October 2026 CPI report at 8:30 a.m. ET on November 10, or 21:30 Beijing time. Bloomberg reported, however, that the release may not include the standard 12-month changes in headline CPI and core CPI, because missing price data during the October 2025 government shutdown left the year-earlier comparison base incomplete.

The October CPI report remains on schedule

This is an unusual CPI publication format, not a canceled report. The BLS release calendar lists the October 2026 Consumer Price Index for publication at 08:30 AM Eastern Time on November 10, 2026, equivalent to 21:30 in Beijing.

Within that scheduled release, Bloomberg said the unavailable fields may be the 12-month percentage changes for headline CPI and core CPI. In other words, the potential gap concerns the annual comparison figures that usually dominate public discussion of inflation, while the report itself is still expected to be released on time.

Why October 2025 affects October 2026 annual CPI

The mechanism is straightforward: a 12-month CPI reading compares prices in the current month with those in the same month a year earlier. Bloomberg linked the expected omission to gaps in price collection during the October 2025 U.S. government shutdown, saying the missing data were not fully recovered afterward.

This also explains the one-year lag between the disruption and the missing annual figure. If the October 2025 comparison point is incomplete, the usual October-to-October annual change may not be publishable in its normal form. The BLS website also lists a CPI notice, dated October 22, 2026, titled “Update regarding data collection for the Consumer Price Index.” While the supplied materials do not include the full notice text, the listing places the data-collection issue on the agency’s timeline.

More broadly, BLS methodology pages describe imputation as a standard approach for dealing with missing price information. However, that general practice does not by itself establish exactly what will be included or omitted in this particular October 2026 release.

What to watch if the usual annual inflation rate is absent

If the annual headline and core measures are unavailable, the practical focus will shift to month-on-month CPI figures and category breakdowns that still show current price momentum. That means assessing whether inflation pressures are broadening or narrowing across major components, rather than relying on the customary year-over-year headline figure.

For markets, the key distinction is between a missing comparison field and a missing inflation report. The report remains scheduled; the reported change is that readers may need to assess it more through monthly moves and component-level detail than through the standard 12-month inflation rate.