US Federal Reserve officials are heading to raise interest rates this week by 75 basis points for the third meeting in a row and indicate that they will go to more than           4 per cent, and then will be maintained at this level, Bloomberg News reported September 19.

Bloomberg said the increase could be even higher, but there are compelling arguments not to make a sudden interest rate hike of 100 basis points, which is likely to prevail when they meet on Tuesday and Wednesday in Washington.

Since the officials’ meeting last July, “the whole” of the data shows, in the words of Board Chairman Jerome Powell, that the economy remains resilient and inflation is rampantly rising. In Europe, German Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel called on the European Central Bank to be firm in dealing with inflation rates, which may reach double what they are now, later this year.

“If the data trend continues, we should go for an additional rate hike, as already agreed in the Governing Council,” Nagel said. We have to be determined in October and beyond.

The European Central Bank raised interest rates by three-quarters of a point this month, a rate described as historic. Economists expect the central bank to take another similar action in October, as policymakers face record inflation. Their work is complicated by the rapidly deteriorating economy and the pressures posed by energy conservation this winter.

During the German central bank’s open day in Frankfurt, Nagel suggested that the momentum would decline in the third and fourth quarters but expressed confidence that the economy could avoid a severe recession.

In Vietnam, Pham Thanh Ha, deputy governor of the Central Bank of Vietnam, said the bank aims to maintain the credit growth ceiling, at 14 per cent, for 2022, ruling out speculation that the regulator will ease lending limits to boost the economy.