MNI BRIEF: Fed Well-Positioned To Wait, Gather Data - Mester

Cleveland Federal Reserve President Loretta Mester on Wednesday said she will be watchful and wait for more data to assess the economic outlook, noting that inflation this year has come in higher than expected.

"My own forecast is that I still expect inflation to come down but I do think that we need to be watching and gathering more information before we take an action," she said at an event in Ohio. "Monetary policy and the economy are in good places," but "if it turned out that inflation isn't sort of moving down back to 2% we could hang where we are for a while longer than in my baseline," she said, also noting that if labor markets unexpectedly deteriorate then the Fed could ease policy. (See: MNI INTERVIEW: One Fed Cut Most Likely 2024 Outcome - Keister)

"At some point, as we get more confidence, we will start to normalize policy back to a less restrictive stance, but we don't have to do that in a hurry."