BofA Total Card Spending (w/e Sep 19th) +6.9% Y/Y (prev. +5.8% W/W); surging gas prices have opened up a gap in ex-gas spending between higher and lower income households

The acceleration in the headline rate is mechanical in part, since a gas-price surge inflates nominal spend without implying real volume growth, and past episodes of sharp fuel moves have shown exactly this pattern of the headline overstating underlying demand. The more informative cut is the divergence in ex-gas spending between higher and lower income cohorts, a dynamic consistent with lower-income households bearing a disproportionate burden from fuel costs and retrenching elsewhere, which is the channel through which energy shocks have historically squeezed discretionary consumption at the bottom of the income distribution while leaving the top largely intact. That split matters for the consumer complex because the K-shaped pattern tends to favour staples and premium-levered names over lower-income-exposed retail and discretionary credit. The follow-ons are whether the gap persists as fuel prices evolve, whether upcoming official retail and PCE data corroborate the slowdown at the lower end, and whether bank card commentary from the next earnings round echoes it.