Federal Reserve: Raising Interest Rates Helps Fight Inflation

US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell pledged more interest rate increases over the coming period in order to control and fight inflation and bring it down to the target level of 2%.

The Federal Reserve raised on Wednesday interest rates by 25 basis points to 4.75%.

Officials of the US Federal Reserve are seeking to slow down interest rate increases for the second consecutive meeting and discuss the extent of their rise after gaining more confidence that inflation will decline this year, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Deliberations among Fed officials could begin Jan. 31-Feb. 1 to discuss how much of a decline in spending and inflation they will need to see before prices are paused this spring.

In recent statements and interviews, Fed officials have said that slowing the pace of rate increases to a more conventional quarter of a percentage point would give them more time to assess the impact of rate hikes so far as they need to decide when to stop.

Officials drew attention to how it took the full effect of higher interest rates to cool down economic activity when it eased to a half-point increase last December, after four consecutive increases of 0.75 points.