By Michael S. Derby
(Reuters) -Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President Beth Hammack said on Monday she sees no imminent need to lower interest rates right now given that inflation is still too high, amid ongoing uncertainty about how trade tariffs will affect price pressures.
“We're pretty close to where the neutral rate is and so I see an economy that's resilient, I see one that's working really well, and I don't see a need to really reduce (interest rates) unless we see material weakening on the labor side,” Hammack said in an interview on Fox Business.
For Hammack, inflation levels that stand above the 2% target remain the main obstacle to cutting the cost of short-term credit.
When it comes to the Federal Open Market Committee meeting scheduled for July 29-30, Hammack told the television channel that “I walk into every meeting with an open mind, waiting to see where the data is going to take us, where the conversation takes us.”
“But from where I sit and what I see, what I see is that we're hitting on our employment side of the mandate, we're not there yet on the inflation side of the mandate,” Hammack said. With inflation still too high, “I think it's important for us to maintain a restrictive posture of monetary policy to make sure that we're getting inflation down to our target of 2%” for inflation.
Most Fed officials who have spoken over recent weeks appear on board with the notion that the current federal funds target rate range, now between 4.25% and 4.5%, will remain in place at the end of the month. At the Fed's June meeting officials penciled in two cuts later this year and investors generally expect that easing to start at the September meeting.
There is however a minority of Fed officials who are open to cutting rates in June, on the basis of the idea that the Trump administration's aggressive and ever-shifting import tax hikes will have a one-time impact on inflation and can be ignored as part of setting monetary policy. Speaking last week, Fed governor Christopher Waller said “we're just too tight and we could consider cutting the policy rate in July.” Waller added his take on rates is “not political.”
The Fed has been facing substantial pressure from President Donald Trump to cut interest rates but officials have so far resisted this pressure and focused on the economic data. In her interview, Hammack cautioned that it remains unclear how the tariffs will play out.
Given the still unfolding influence of the tariffs, “I think wait and see is the best place for us to be, because I think we don't know exactly what those impacts are going to be.”
(Reporting by Michael S. Derby; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama )
