(Reuters) – Federal Reserve governor Christopher Waller said on Thursday he supports another 75-basis-point interest rate increase at the central bank’s next meeting later this month, but would lean toward a larger hike if incoming data shows demand is not slowing fast enough to bring inflation down.
The Fed “is now, and must be, utterly focused on moving inflation down toward our 2 percent target,” Waller said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Rocky Mountain Economic Summit.
After a Labor Department report Wednesday showed consumer prices rose 9.1% in June, traders swifly priced in a 100-basis-point rate hike for the Fed’s July meeting.
(Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)