By Siddharth Cavale
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Prices for goods made in China and sold on Amazon.com (AMZN) have been rising faster than overall inflation, according to an analysis of 1,400 different products conducted exclusively for Reuters by the analytics firm DataWeave, a sign that tariffs are starting to hit American consumers.
The analysis shows that price increases for those goods accelerated beginning in May, a signal U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs are starting to filter through to consumers. The median price of a basket of more than 1,400 products made in China and sold on Amazon.com to U.S. buyers has gone up by 2.6% between January and mid-June, outpacing the latest U.S. inflation rate for core goods, which runs only through May.
Price increases vary depending on the item sold, and prices for some goods declined.
For the six months through May, core goods CPI – which excludes services – rose by 1%, implying a 2% annualized rate. Both the federal data and DataWeave’s study show that goods costs have trended upward in the last couple of months as tariffs begin to exert pressure on prices.
DataWeave analyzed more than 25,000 items, focusing on 1,407 products sold on Amazon because those clearly list China as the country of origin. The firm used median prices rather than averages, since averages can be skewed by short-term price spikes or unusually high or low values.
The basket of China-made goods includes products sold by Amazon as well as its third-party sellers. Third-party sellers account for 62% of all products sold on Amazon.
The goods rising at the fastest rate include school and office supplies, electronic items such as printers and shredders, blank media items like CDs and DVDs, and home goods such as furnishings and cookware. China, which shipped $438.9 billion of goods last year to the U.S., is a big global supplier in all of these categories.
Of the 1,407 items tracked in the DataWeave study between January and June 17, 475 showed price increases, 633 remained unchanged, and 299 saw price declines. For example, a Hamilton Beach electric kettle climbed to a median $73.21 from $49.99, while the price of a GreenPan frying pan more than doubled to $31.99.
Through April, inflation across that product group remained modest. Prices increased more sharply in May and accelerated into June, particularly in the Home & Furniture and Electronics categories, which showed a median increase of 3.5% and 3.1%, respectively, over the time frame of the study.
Seasonal dynamics could play a role, but the timing and rate suggest cost shocks are rippling through the retail supply chain, said Karthik Bettadapura, co-founder and CEO of DataWeave.
