Kai Risdahl

Even oil, without too much argument, the economic bellwether of this war, up only a couple of percent for the global benchmark.

So in an attempt to separate the signal from the noise, we're going to spend the first part of the program today on the nuts and bolts, the ways the economy keeps on grinding while geopolitics does its thing.

And then, as promised, we will get to the first of our Vietnam reporting.

The big Wall Street story today is of the big banks, which are going to be reporting earnings the next couple of days.

Goldman Sachs started things off this morning.

Profits were up in Q1 almost 20% compared to the same time a year ago, thanks in part to the revenue it earned advising companies on mergers and acquisitions and other kinds of corporate deals, of which one should say there have been many this year.

But as Marketplace's Justin Ho reports, it is also likely we're going to see some signs this week the war is affecting bank earnings.

Some of these companies are going to say, hey, we finally have a need to do some of these bigger capital projects to expand, and that's going to be increased loan volume for really any banks that have that sort of energy exposure.

Wall Street to start the week.

Traders not at all upset by the geopolitical turn of events.

We will have the details...

Oil and energy costs, as we told you last week, drove inflation higher in March, 9 tenths percent month over month, 3.3 percent year over year.

Although is not grim in the world of price levels, one category that bucked the trend and saw a little inflation slow down, not to be clear falling prices, but prices going up more slowly than expected.

That category is an important one.

Food at home.

Grocery prices.

In other words, grocery inflation came in at a relatively tame 1.9% annually.

Marketplace's Kristen Schwab has more on that.

Even as drivers are staring down rising prices at the pump, $4.12 a gallon today, so says AAA.

The cars and trucks we are driving have, on the whole, gotten slightly more fuel efficient.