Powell on Trump’s economic plans: “Premature to draw conclusions”

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Wednesday it’s too soon to say what President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed economic policies will do to the economy and how that might bear on the central bank’s policy choices.

At this point, “it’s very premature to make any kind of conclusions. We don’t know what will be tariffed, from what countries, for how long, in what size,” Powell said in a press conference following the latest Federal Open Market Committee meeting. “We need to take our time, not rush” and see what the new president delivers, Powell said, amid economists’ expectations that tariffs and deportations favoured by Trump are likely to push inflation higher.