Mubasher: US consumers scaled back their spending in August, despite an upturn in their personal income, official data showed on Friday.

Personal-consumption expenditures (PCEs), a gauge of household spending on items from airline tickets to furniture, increased by a seasonally adjusted 0.1% last August, from a growth of 0.5% in July, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) said.

Meanwhile, US personal income, which reflects Americans’ pretax earnings from salaries and other sources including investments, climbed by 0.4% or $73.5 billion last month.

The PCE price index, which is closely watched by the Federal Reserve for gauging inflation, rose by less than 0.1% month-on-month in August.

Excluding volatile items such as food and energy, the index went up by 0.1% during the month.

By 12:27 pm GMT, the US dollar index ticked up by 0.04%to 99.1680, while the EUR/USD pair rose by 0.17% to $1.0940.