- The Federal Reserve is expected to announce an interest rate cut of 25 basis points on Wednesday, but one former Fed official might have pressed pause instead.
The Federal Reserve is expected to cut its key interest rate by 25 basis points on Wednesday. But should it? Former Kansas City Fed President Esther George said she wouldn’t. “This is a time to be very cautious,” she said in an interview on Tuesday.
Inflation is not decelerating the way it previously had. Prices rose in November, for one, and inflation still hasn’t fallen to the Fed’s target. This isn’t to say progress hasn’t been made. We’re a long ways away from the four-decade high in June 2022, which is why the central bank began its cutting cycle in September. It delivered a 50 basis-point slash, which was a surprise to some. Then the Fed announced its second reduction in November: a smaller, 25 basis point cut.
Traders in the Federal funds futures market are mostly pricing in a 25 basis point cut for December—more than 95% are betting on it. Less than 5% think the Fed will leave rates unchanged, and no one sees an interest rate hike happening.
So while George would be inclined to vote no on a cut, she expects there will be one. Plus, a quarter of a percentage point won’t make or break inflation, she explained. Still, she thinks it’s time for the Fed to “signal to markets and to the public that they have not taken their eye off the ball of inflation.”
In its December meeting, apart from potentially announcing an interest rate cut, the central bank and its chairman, Jerome Powell, will reveal economic projections for the new year. “I do expect that we will see some adjustments in their inflation path,” George said. “I think we’ll see some adjustments in the Fed funds rate path to show that it will be a slower, more gradual, downward move over the next year or so.”
It’s unclear what that’ll look like. It could mean leaving interest rates unchanged for a bit. There is a new presidential administration to consider, too. Economists previously told Fortune they see President-elect Donald Trump’s policies as inflationary, whether that’s regarding his threats of tariffs, or promises of mass deportation and more tax cuts. However, the Fed is very clear in that it makes decisions based on data rather than in anticipation of something.
“You have inflation running well above that 2% target, and it’s shown to be sticky right now, regardless of how precise one could be about potential policies coming forward in 2025,” George said.
She continued: “If you’re a risk manager at this point, if you’re thinking about what lies ahead, and you’ve yet to achieve your 2% target, you will move carefully to make sure that you’re not ceding the credibility that you want in terms of low and stable inflation. So I think it’s a time to just be careful.”
Powell himself, at the New York Times’s DealBook Summit earlier this month, said the Fed could be “more cautious” as it cuts interest rates, acknowledging that inflation was a “little higher” than anticipated. He obviously didn’t comment on what the Fed would do this week, or how the central bank is thinking about Trump 2.0, but he did say: “We’re now on a path to bring rates back down to a more neutral level over time.”
