San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly said inflation is “uncomfortably high” in the US. And, it’s time to “start removing some of the accommodation we’ve been giving to the economy,”

“I definitely see rate increases coming, as early as March even,” she noted. But she didn’t want to predict the number of rate hikes needed for this year.

Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic said, “I penciled in six rate hikes for 2022 and two more for 2023,”

“I recognize that I am toward the bottom of the distribution relative to my colleagues, but the elevated levels of uncertainty are front forward in my mind and have tempered my confidence that an extremely aggressive rate path is appropriate today,” he added.

“The risks go both ways,” Bostic said. “Should demand falter in the face of economic uncertainty or removal of monetary policy accommodation, then the appropriate path may be shallower than I currently project. But there are other developments, such as shifts in supply strategies, that could mean higher costs and thus motivate a steeper policy path than I expect.”

Philadelphia Fed President Patrick Harker said in an article, “inflation is far too high across most goods and services in our economy. But I find shelter inflation, along with food inflation, particularly alarming…. We must do everything we can to get shelter inflation under control.”

“Monetary policy has a role to play here, and the Federal Reserve is working to stabilize inflation and put the economy on a firmer footing for the long haul,” he said. “But getting shelter inflation under control will require action not just by the Fed, but also by federal, state, and local governments.”

Full article here.

Fed Governor Michelle Bowman warned in a speech that “financial pressures on many small businesses remain acute”. She’s concerned that “a growing number of small businesses have already been closed permanently or are on the verge of failure”.

While the pandemic restrictions may have been helpful, she said, “they appear to have disproportionately impeded small firms’ ability to maintain their operations and revenue sources, leading to substantial cash-flow pressures.” The restrictions “came at a very high economic cost,” she added.

“My FOMC colleagues and I expect to maintain an accommodative stance of monetary policy until employment and inflation achieve levels consistent with our maximum employment and inflation goals,” she concluded. “At this point, the economy is still a long way from those goals. We are making progress, but I think it will take some time for us to get there.”

Full speech here.