After cheering CPI, Fed’s Mester reiterates: big risks remain on inflation

Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President Loretta Mester said Thursday that while there are some new hopeful signs of moderating inflation, the main risk still facing the US central bank is that it doesn’t act aggressively enough to tame very high price pressures.

Given the current level of inflation, its broad-based nature, and its persistence, I believe monetary policy will need to become more restrictive and remain restrictive for a while in order to put inflation on a sustainable downward path to 2%,” Mester said.

“Despite the moves we have made so far, given that inflation has consistently proven to be more persistent than expected and there are significant costs of continued high inflation, I currently view the larger risks as coming from tightening too little”, she said.

“This morning’s October CPI report also suggests some easing in overall and core inflation,” she said adding that “there continue to be some upside risks to the inflation forecast”.