WASHINGTON, Nov. 18 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Monday met with Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to discuss the economy and the central bank's monetary policy.
"Just finished a very good & cordial meeting at the White House with Jay Powell of the Federal Reserve. Everything was discussed including interest rates, negative interest, low inflation, easing, Dollar strength and its effect on manufacturing, trade with China, E.U. and others, etc," Trump said in a tweet Monday morning.
The Fed, meanwhile, said in a statement that Powell met with the president and the treasury secretary "at the president's invitation" to discuss the economy, growth, employment and inflation.
"Chair Powell's comments were consistent with his remarks at his congressional hearings last week," the Fed statement read, referring to the hearings held by the Joint Economic Committee of Congress and the House Budget Committee, when Powell suggested that the central bank is unlikely to adjust interest rates anytime soon as long as the U.S. economy remains along its present path.
"He did not discuss his expectations for monetary policy, except to stress that the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming information that bears on the outlook for the economy," the Fed said.
The Fed has already lowered rates three times since July, amid growing risks and uncertainties stemming from trade tensions, weakness in global growth and muted inflation pressures. These policy adjustments put the current federal funds rate target range at 1.5 to 1.75 percent.
Powell said that he and his colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed's policy-setting body, will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based "solely on careful, objective and non-political analysis," the Fed statement added.
Trump had repeatedly lashed out at the Fed's monetary policies in recent months, renewing his criticism last week that the central bank's hesitation in lowering the interest rates impeded U.S. economic growth and capped gains in the stock market. Powell said several times that the Fed's policy is not influenced by political considerations.
