“We’ve moved much closer to our destination,” Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said during a Wednesday press conference.
He added that officials would still like to see “credible evidence that inflation is topping out and then beginning to come down.”
The Fed kicked off a series of aggressive rate hikes last year as prices soared across the country, hoping to slow the economy and tamp down on decades-high inflation.
Figures from the Labor Department show the annual inflation rate fell to 4 percent from June last year, when it reached 9.1 percent. But that’s still higher than where the Fed wants it.
“The inflation data supports the notion of at least a pause in the Federal Reserve’s rate hike campaign as it tries to push inflation back toward its long-term target of 2 percent,” Joe Brusuelas, chief economist at audit and tax firm RSM, wrote in a Tuesday analysis.
Currently, the Fed funds rate range is at 5 to 5.25 percent, which is the highest it’s been in more than a decade.
“Holding the target range steady at this meeting allows the Committee to assess additional information and its implications for monetary policy,” the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) said, as some experts and lawmakers have raised concerns over the threat of a recession later this year.
However, the pause is only expected to be temporary, as some FOMC members anticipate more pressure will be needed to tackle inflation in the months ahead.
The Hill’s Tobias Burns has more here.
