Fed meeting recap: Everything Powell said during Wednesday's market-moving news conference

The Federal Reserve held steady on interest rates at the conclusion of its March meeting, and it's sticking with its forecast for three interest rate cuts. During a news conference Fed Chair Jerome Powell noted that a strong jobs market wouldn't deter the central bank from cutting rates.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell will continue to seek confirmation inflation is moving closer to the central bank's 2% target, even after a recent spate of hotter inflation readings.

"The other thing is, in the second half of the year, you had some pretty low readings, so it might be harder to make that 12 month window forward," Powell said.

"Nonetheless, we're looking for data that confirm the low readings that we had last year," Powell continued. "And give us a higher degree of confidence that what we saw was really inflation moving sustainably down to 2%."

— Sarah Min

Continued strength in the labor market wouldn't be a reason to hold off lowering interest rates, said Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.

"Strong hiring in and of itself would not be a reason to hold off on rate cuts," he said, adding that the job market by itself is not cause for concern around inflation. Earlier, Powell said "an unexpected weakening in the labor market could also warrant a policy response."

— Alex Harring

Major inflationary data points — the consumer price index and personal consumption expenditure — rose for both January and February. Fed Chair Jerome Powell thinks this data is just further proof of inflation's nonlinear path downwards.

"I think they haven't really changed the overall story, which is that of inflation moving down gradually on a sometimes bumpy road toward 2%," he said during a press conference on Wednesday afternoon. "We're not