China’s producer inflation accelerated to its fastest rate in nearly 4-1/2 years in October as higher global oil prices raised manufacturing costs, even as consumer inflation cooled amid weak domestic demand, data showed on Monday. The war in the Middle East has kept energy prices high, raising costs for coal mining, oil and natural gas extraction and processing, chemicals and other energy-intensive sectors, a key driver of producer-price inflation. But those upstream price pressures have yet to fully feed through to consumers as weak household demand constrains spending in the world’s second-largest ... (full story)