US policy makers can probably sit and wait after bringing interest rates to a peak in March, and they may even avoid a recession in the process, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Charles Evans said.
“By spring of next year we are going to get to a funds rate that we can sort of sit and watch how things are behaving,” he told CNBC Europe on Tuesday. “And if inflation starts to come down, things will be more restrictive and we would want to adjust downward.”
Evans, who during his 15-year tenure at the helm of the Chicago Fed has often been one of the central bank’s biggest doves, also suggested that officials might successfully skirt a recession. He says there’s even a possibility of raising rates less than the current consensus suggests.
“The median forecasts, are to get to the peak funds rate by March, assuming there are no adverse shocks,” he said. “And if things get better, you know, then we could perhaps do less, but I think we’re headed for that peak funds rate, and that offers a path for employment you know, stabilizing, at something that still is not a recession. But there could be shocks.”
The US central bank has been tightening monetary policy quickly this year in a bid to bring inflation down from the highest levels in four decades. On Sept. 21, the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee hiked its benchmark federal funds rate by three-quarters of a percentage point for the third time in a row, taking it above 3% for the first time since before the financial crisis.
Fed officials also signaled they expected to authorize another 1.25 percentage points of increases over the final two policy meetings of the year in November and December, according to the median of their projections. Investors currently expect a fourth straight increase of 75 basis points at the Nov. 1-2 meeting, according to prices of futures contracts.
“The exact timing of that path to me is less important than the fact that we continue to get to the point where we think we ought to be,” Evans said. “Whether or not it’s a larger increase at the next meeting or continued increases to get there, before very long if you just look everybody’s projections we’ve pretty much got the same spot by March.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.