On February 18, Federal Reserve Governor Paul Waller said that his basic view is that the Trump administration's new tariffs will only have a modest impact on prices, which the central bank should try to ignore when setting monetary policy. Waller said that uncertainty about the impact of trade or other government policies should not prevent the Federal Reserve from taking action, just as neither the Russia-Ukraine conflict in 2022 nor the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank in 2023 prevented the Federal Reserve from adjusting interest rates, even though both events raised questions about the economic outlook. In his speech, Waller said: "I acknowledge that the impact of tariffs may be larger than I expected... But we also need to keep in mind that other policies under discussion may also have positive supply effects and put downward pressure on inflation." Mr. Waller, who was appointed to the Fed during President Trump's first term, said he agreed that policy should be kept on hold until inflation fell again. But he said it was probably only a matter of time, noting that the recent "disappointing" rise in the CPI was likely to reflect seasonal data adjustments rather than rising price pressures.