Fed needs more data before it can make a tapering decision
Speaking ahead of US inflation data, St Louis Federal Reserve president James Bullard has said the Fed would need more data before it can make a a definitive decision about the timeline for tapering off its asset purchase programme.
He reiterated that a decision to reduce the pace of asset purchases would not change the committee's commitment to keeping rates near zero. In what can safely be called an understatement, he said the market reaction to the initial announcement "maybe didn't go very well".
Bullard added that there seemed to be no satisfactory explanation of why inflation has remained so low.