A Powell problem
Trump fails to deter rate-riser resolve
Despite fierce blowback from President Trump, the Federal Reserve’s policymakers unanimously agree they should keep hiking interest rates to cap inflation.
That’s according to the minutes of the latest Fed meeting, in which every policymaker backed a move to raise interest rates in September. The display of solidarity raises the prospect of a fourth rate hike this year, in December.
The release of the minutes comes amid growing tensions between the White House and the Fed, which is an independent agency.
Last week, Trump called the Fed “loco” and “too aggressive” for its commitment to cooling the economy, and blamed the central bank for the more than 1,000-point drop in the Dow Jones industrial average last week.
Trump, who has openly criticized the Fed since July, doubled down on Tuesday, declaring the Fed his “biggest threat” in an interview on Fox Business.
But Trump’s complaints don’t seem to have fazed the honchos at the world’s most important central bank.
Members of the Federal Open Market Committee, which determines the Fed’s monetary policy, didn’t bother to discuss comments made by Trump warning against further increases in the central bank’s benchmark interest rate, according to minutes of the Sept. 25-27 meeting released Wednesday.
Instead, some members of the committee believed that the Fed would need to impose “modestly restrictive” conditions on the economy, the minutes show.
The Dow Jones industrial average on Wednesday fell 91.74 points, to 25,706.68.
The minutes did suggest, however, that the committee remains split on how much further to raise rates next year, with a few participants expecting the rates would need to rise enough to modestly restrain economic growth.
Two others “indicated that they would not favor adopting a restrictive policy stance in the absence of clear signs of an overheating economy and rising inflation.”