President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, Raphael W. Bostic seen in this handout photo obtained by Reuters October 6, 2017. Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta/Handout via REUTERS
January 8, 2018
ATLANTA, Ga (Reuters) – Atlanta Federal Reserve bank president Raphael Bostic joined in warning that a flattening yield curve should be treated cautiously, and the central bank should avoid actions that could lead it to invert.
“I am going to do all I can to make sure our policy does not invert the yield curve explicitly. We will be watching that,” Bostic said on Monday. “If we got close to it I would argue strongly that we should be extremely cautious” with further rate increases. He said his “base case” was for two to three rate increases in 2018, compared to a median of three among his colleagues.
(Reporting by Howard Schneider; Editing by Andrea Ricci)