A top official at the US central bank has called on the Federal Reserve to immediately resume raising interest rates after forgoing an increase last month, citing scant evidence that inflationary pressures are easing as needed.
Lorie Logan, president of the Dallas Fed and a voting member this year on the Federal Open Market Committee, disclosed on Thursday that she was among the officials who thought a quarter-point interest rate rise at the June meeting was “entirely appropriate” in light of strong incoming data as she laid out the case for the central bank to further squeeze the US economy.
At the most recent meeting, officials unanimously supported a pause in the Fed’s historic monetary tightening campaign after 10 consecutive interest rate rises, but signalled that half a percentage point more worth of increases would be necessary in order to damp demand sufficiently.