Fed’s Bullard Leans 'More Strongly' to Third 75 Basis-Point Rate Hike

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard says he has become more supportive of a third straight 75 basis-point interest rate increase and Wall Street is underestimating the likelihood that the Fed will hold rates at higher levels next year.

‘’I was leaning toward 75 and the jobs report was reasonably good last Friday,” Bullard said in a Bloomberg News interview late Thursday in St. Louis. While the consumer price index may show progress when it’s reported next week, “I wouldn’t let one data point sort of dictate what we are going to do at this meeting. So I am leaning more strongly toward 75 at this point.”

James Bullard, president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, speaks during a Bloomberg Television interview at the Jackson Hole economic symposium in Moran, Wyoming, US, on Friday, Aug. 26, 2022. Federal Reserve officials stressed the need to keep raising interest rates even as they reserved judgment on how big they should go at their meeting next month.

Officials meet Sept. 20-21 and investors are fully expecting another jumbo move, following 75 basis-point increases in June and July, after Chair Jerome Powell on Thursday stressed they will not flinch in the battle to curb to curb inflation that’s running close to a 40-year high.