WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Inflation will hit 2.5% this year and not fall much in 2022, which the Federal Reserve should welcome as a way to reaffirm the central bank’s inflation target, St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President James Bullard said on Tuesday.
“I am not seeing the inflation rate come down very much in 2022 … maybe just slightly,” Bullard said in comments that placed him among the more aggressive Fed officials in terms of willingness to see inflation move higher this year and remain there without raising interest rates. “Part of the goal is to take the increase in inflation that we have this year penciled in and allow some of that to move through to inflation expectations,” and keep them cemented at the Fed’s 2% inflation target.
(Reporting by Howard Schneider; Editing by Leslie Adler)
