NEW YORK (MaceNews) – New York Fed President John Williams Thursday declined to say he favored a rate cut at the next Federal Open Market Committee meeting, saying instead that policy-makers are still assessing the need for additional measures.
Williams, speaking to reporters after a speech to an industry group, was asked whether he favored a rate cut at the October FOMC meeting. He responded that past rate cuts were taken to address worries about trade uncertainty, slowing global growth, and low inflation, and that “past actions have positioned us appropriately …. Our cuts we have done were a reaction to those factors.”
Just because the same conditions remain in play “doesn’t mean we have to keep taking the same actions,” he said.
“Looking forward, we are going to take a meeting by meeting approach” and weigh whether policy measures are needed to keep growth continuing and inflation moving toward the 2 % goal.
Williams said policy-makers would be concerned about consumption if there were signs of slowing growth in jobs and incomes, but these factors are “still pretty favorable.”
“So far the consumer is very resilient,” he said, noting that the latest US retail sales report may have appeared soft on its face, but a closer look at the report, including past revisions, showed it was “still pretty positive.”
Williams said he was “somewhat concerned” by signs of lower consumer and market inflation expectations, including the New York Fed’s own gauge, but he did not yet see significant declines in inflation expectations. “It’s certainly something to watch,” he said.