Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell explains the decision to leave the policy rate, federal funds rate, unchanged at the range of 5.25%-5.5% and responds to questions in the post-meeting press conference.
Key quotes
"The Summary of Economic Projections are not a plan or any kind of decision."
"Assessment of policy will adjust."
"If the economy remains solid and inflation persists, will keep rates where they are for as long as needed."
"The opposite is also true in terms of rate cuts."
"Policy is well-positioned, will continue to make decisions meeting by meeting."
"We are practicing a slight element of conservatism on our inflation outlook."
"We don't have high confidence in forecasts."
"We welcome today's inflation reading, hope for more like that."
"We need more confidence on inflation moving back down to 2%."
"The test for cutting rates is more confidence that inflation is moving toward 2%."
"We have a fairly conservative forecast on inflation, if we get better readings, I think we will see forecasts come down."
"We all agree that we are data dependent."
"No one on the Committee has a strong commitment to a rate forecast."
"We have no commitment to a particular rate cut."
"Policymakers are not trying to send a strong signal with forecasts."
