Fed Chair Powell: ‘We’ve Had Two Very Strong Goods Inflation Readings in the Last Two Months, Which Is Very Unexpected’

EXCERPT:

POWELL: “I — you know, only in kind of a early way. I mean, it’s only been a few months, right? For example, the layoffs that are happening here are — they’re certainly meaningful to the people involved and they may be meaningful to a particular neighborhood or a region or area, but at the national level, they’re not significant yet, but we don’t know. We don’t know what — how far that will go. We’ll find out much more. I mentioned that you saw, we’ve had two — two very strong goods inflation readings in the last two months, which is very unexpected, I think, hard to trace it to specific tariffs, but it must have, it must have something to do with — it’s either noise and it will come back and that’s very possible too, but if it is persistent, then it must be to do with, you know, people buying ahead of tariffs or raising prices ahead of tariffs, and things like that.”