Beisent: Not urging the Fed to cut interest rates, just citing model results.

On August 14, U.S. Treasury Secretary Bessenet stated that he is not calling for the Fed to undertake a series of rate cuts, but merely pointed out that models show the "neutral" interest rate will be about 1.5 percentage points lower than it is now. Bessenet said, "I did not tell the Fed what to do." He was referring to comments made the previous day about the Fed "being able to start a series of rate cuts." Bessenet stated on Thursday, "What I said is that to achieve the neutral rate, we would need to cut rates by about 150 basis points. If one believes in the existence of a neutral rate, I think there is room for a series of rate cuts, but I am not calling for rate cuts, nor have I made such a call. I am just saying that the estimated neutral rate from the model is about 150 basis points lower than the current level."