US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Tuesday sought to reassure lawmakers and investors that the central bank can pull off the tricky task of bringing down four-decade-high inflation without damaging the US economy.
In a two-and-a-half hour congressional confirmation hearing, Powell said that the Fed was on course to begin raising interest rates from near zero and reducing its US$8.8 trillion balance sheet.
However, he portrayed those steps as a move away from an ultra-expansionary emergency policy put in place to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, not as a shift to a restrictive stance aimed at cooling an overheating economy.
“We’re really just