(Reuters) – Minneapolis Federal Reserve Chairman Neel Kashkari said he could back interest rates at the next central bank meeting in June to give officials more time to assess the effects of past rate increases and the outlook for inflation, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

“I’m open to the idea that we can go a little slower from now on,” he said in an interview conducted on Friday and published on Sunday.

Neel Kashkari, a member of the Fed’s monetary policy committee responsible for setting rates, however, said his opinion was not yet settled: “I would take issue with any statement that we’re done.”

To cope with persistently high inflation following the COVID-19 pandemic, the US Federal Reserve (Fed) has made large hikes over the past year, including a 25 basis point hike at the start of the month. months, setting benchmark rates in a range of 5% to 5.25%, the highest level since the run-up to the 2008 financial crisis.

Although inflation has shown signs of moderating since the summer of 2022, it remains well above the Fed’s 2% target. The latter was asked to refrain from any further tightening in order to reduce the risk of a recession in the American economy.

(Report by Juby Babu in Bangalore, Benjamin Mallet)

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