WASHINGTON: A US Federal Reserve official said Friday (Jun 20) that the central bank could cut interest rates as early as July, after policymakers this week kept rates unchanged for a fourth straight meeting.
“We can start the process of bringing rates down, and then if there’s some big shock due to maybe the Middle East conflict, we can pause,” Fed governor Christopher Waller told CNBC in an interview.
“I think we’re in that position that we could do this, and as early as July,” he added.
The Fed has held the benchmark lending rate steady at a range between 4.25 per cent and 4.50 per cent since the start of the year, despite President Donald Trump repeatedly urging the independent central bank for rate reductions.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell said Wednesday that the bank would make smarter decisions if it waited to understand how Trump’s tariffs impact the world’s biggest economy, expecting to learn more over the summer.
“I think you’d want to start slow,” Waller said on CNBC. “But start the process, that’s the key thing.”
He argued that central banks should “look through tariff effects on inflation” and focus instead on the underlying trend in price increases.
