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A report due out Tuesday is expected to show that prices cooled again in November, giving some relief to households and businesses being squeezed by high inflation and the Federal Reserve’s ongoing fight to slow the economy, the Washington Post reported. Analysts forecast that data to be released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics will show that prices rose around 7.3 percent in November compared to last year, and roughly 0.2 percent over October. Those figures are way too high for a healthy economy, but they would show further progress since the most recent inflation report, which would offer policymakers and the American public fresh hope that the Fed’s aggressive moves to tame inflation are paying off. The latest inflation data comes as the Federal Reserve convenes for its final meeting of the year. Officials are widely expected to raise interest rates by half a percentage point on Wednesday, a slightly slower pace than they have been on since the summer. They will also release a fresh set of internal projections showing how much further rates could climb and how long borrowing costs may stay high. The central bank’s baseline rate is expected to eclipse 5 percent before the Fed pauses hikes sometime next year. It sat near zero for much of the pandemic.

U.S. Supreme Court justices yesterday seemed skeptical of whether bankruptcy can be used to wipe out debts incurred through fraud even in cases in which an individual declaring bankruptcy was not the one who committed the fraud, Reuters reported. California resident Kate Bartenwerfer asked the high court to overturn a ruling from the Ninth
U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that said she could not use bankruptcy to escape liability stemming from fraudulent omissions her husband made in selling a house regardless of whether she knew about it. Bartenwerfer's attorney Sarah Harris told the justices at oral arguments that the entire point of bankruptcy law is to give honest debtors like Bartenwerfer the ability to clear debts and have a "fresh start." If Bartenwerfer is unable to discharge liability for her husband's misstatements, then other innocent debtors could also face a lifetime of debt due to others' fraudulent conduct, Harris said. "That financial death sentence would fall mostly on unsophisticated spouses," Harris said. "Dishonest debtors cannot escape their creditors, but the court does not consign unwitting debtors to the same fate." The attorney for Kieran Buckley, who sued the Bartenwerfers for selling him a house while withholding information about major defects, said that his client should not be left without recourse due to Bartenwerfer's bankruptcy.

The Supreme Court agreed yesterday to decide whether the Biden administration had overstepped its authority with its plan to wipe out billions of dollars in student debt, the New York Times reported. The justices put the case on an unusually fast track, saying that they would hear arguments in February. In the meantime, though, they left in place an injunction blocking the program. The court’s brief order gave no reasons and did not note any dissents. The court acted after the Justice Department filed an emergency application asking the justices to lift the injunction, which had been issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, in St. Louis, at the request of six Republican-led states. The program, which forgives up to $20,000 in debt for millions of federal borrowers, has set off a flurry of legal battles, but the one filed by the six states — Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina — may represent the most serious threat. The states have said that Mr. Biden’s proposal exceeds his executive authority and would deprive them of future tax revenue. Since March 2020, most borrowers have been able to skip payments under a coronavirus relief measure that began under President Donald J. Trump and was extended multiple times, including under President Biden. Last week, the Biden administration again extended the pause on payments, pushing them until as late as September. Nearly 26 million borrowers have applied to have some of their student loan debt erased. While the government has approved 16 million applications, no debt has been canceled yet. The Education Department, which owns and manages the government’s $1.5 trillion student debt portfolio, has stopped accepting applications in light of the legal challenges.

Alex Jones filed for bankruptcy on Friday, less than two months after a jury ordered him and the parent company of his Infowars website to pay nearly $1 billion in compensatory damages to relatives of victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook mass shooting, Reuters reported. Jones filed for chapter 11 protection from creditors with the U.S. bankruptcy court in Houston, a court filing showed. The filing said Jones has between $1 million and $10 million of assets and between $1 billion and $10 billion of liabilities. n October, a Connecticut jury in a case brought by relatives of more than a dozen Sandy Hook victims ordered Jones and Free Speech Systems, the parent company of Infowars, to pay nearly $1 billion in damages. Free Speech Systems filed for bankruptcy in July. In a separate case in Texas, a jury in August decided Jones must pay the parents of a 6-year-old boy killed in the Sandy Hook massacre $45.2 million in punitive damages, on top of $4.1 million in compensatory damages.

The consumer credit-scoring system has long been opaque and confusing. One change intended to help people navigate the system has created a whole new set of problems, the Wall Street Journal reported. In recent years, a government website has made it easier for people to file claims of identity theft so they can remove fraudulent accounts from their credit reports. Those reports are the basis of credit scores sold by Equifax Inc., Experian and TransUnion to banks as they make lending decisions. That has smoothed the claims process for people who have fallen victim to identity theft. But the credit-reporting industry says it is also being hit by illegitimate claims, facilitated by companies that promise to help customers fix low credit scores for a fee. These companies file false identity-theft claims on items that bring down customer’s credit scores, like delinquent credit-card debt, often without that person’s knowledge. The move often removes that information from the consumer’s credit reports while the claim is investigated. The practice is known in the industry as credit washing, since a person’s credit reports can look better than they really are, at least temporarily, and so can their scores. Credit washing has slowed down the process of getting loans at some banks while lenders look for other ways to evaluate potential borrowers. It has added to questions about how useful credit scores really are and eroded banks’ confidence in the credit-reporting system they have relied on for decades. Equifax, Experian and TransUnion get millions of letters each year that allege errors on credit reports, many claiming identity theft, according to people familiar with the matter. It isn’t known how many are illegitimate claims. Sometimes the companies receive batches of similar letters claiming identity theft or other issues at once — mailed from the same ZIP Code on the same date, some with the same typos.

A federal appeals court yesterday declined to put on hold a Texas judge's ruling that said President Joe Biden's plan to cancel hundreds of billions of dollars in student loan debt was unlawful, Reuters reported. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit rejected the Biden administration's request to pause a judge's Nov. 10 order vacating the $400 billion student debt relief program in a lawsuit pursued by a conservative advocacy group. The decision by Fort Worth, Texas-based U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman was one of two nationally that has prevented the U.S. Department of Education under the Democratic president from moving forward with granting debt relief to millions of borrowers. The administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to similarly lift an order by the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit that, at the request of six Republican-led states, had barred it from cancelling student loans. A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit in Wednesday's brief order declined to put Pittman's ruling on hold while the administration appealed his decision, but the court directed that the appeal be heard on an expedited basis.

U.S. shoppers spent $11.3 billion on Cyber Monday, a robust showing that suggests steep discounts attracted inflation-stung shoppers, Bloomberg News reported. Spending increased 5.8% from a year ago, making it the biggest online shopping day ever, according to Adobe Inc., which compiles the data. Adobe adjusted its online spending forecast for November and December slightly upward based on higher-than-expected spending through Cyber Monday. The promotional period from Thanksgiving through Monday — now known as the Cyber Five — was nothing like 2021, when supply-chain snarls prompted people to shop earlier and retailers to skimp on discounts. This year stores were saddled with a glut of unsold merchandise, forcing them to offer sharply reduced prices to lure bargain-hunters looking to offset higher food and fuel costs. “With oversupply and a softening consumer spending environment, retailers made the right call this season to drive demand through heavy discounting,” said Vivek Pandya, lead analyst at Adobe Digital Insights. “It spurred online spending to levels that were higher than expected, and reinforced e-commerce as a major channel to drive volume and capture consumer interest.” Hot items included Legos, drones and digital cameras. Discounts were steeper compared with a year earlier. For instance, electronics had mark-downs that peaked at 25%, according to Adobe, which tracks 1 trillion visits to retail websites and monitors sales of more than 100 million products.