MADRID, 3 Abr. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The president of the United States Federal Reserve (Fed), Jerome Powell, assured this Wednesday that the organization has “time” to decide the appropriate moment to lower interest rates, and has insisted that they will not be modified until the leading institution has greater confidence about the convergence of inflation with the 2% objective.
“Given the strength of the economy and the progress made so far on inflation, we have time to let emerging data guide our economic policy decisions,” Powell explained.
“We do not believe that it is appropriate to lower interest rates until we have greater confidence that inflation is heading steadily towards 2%,” he added, but not before making it clear that it is still too early to know if the readings recent inflation rates represent “more than just a blip.”
During his speech at the Business, Government and Society Forum at Stanford University, Powell indicated, in any case, that these data do not “substantially” change his forecasts. Thus, he has reiterated his expectation that it will probably be appropriate to start lowering the price of money this year.
“If the economy overall evolves as we expect, most FOMC [Federal Open Market Committee] participants likely see it appropriate to begin lowering rates at some point this year,” he elaborated.
Asked why not lower them now if the risks in the economy are balanced, Powell recalled that cutting them prematurely could compromise the progress obtained with inflation or even reverse it.
In another vein, Powell has stated that it is “too early” to evaluate the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on the productivity of the US economy, although he has been convinced that it will contribute to its increase in the face of the future.
