Jerome Powell, chair of the Federal Reserve, signaled little urgency to lower interest rates with the economy sturdy and inflation still too high in a hearing with lawmakers Tuesday.

Powell, who testified before the Senate Banking Committee, confronts an economic and political landscape that is far different from what it was when he last appeared before Congress in July. The Fed has paused its rate-cutting plans with inflation still above its target, and questions are swirling about how it will navigate the economic and institutional ramifications of tariffs and other policies that President Donald Trump has put at the center of his presidency.

“We do not need to be in a hurry to adjust our policy stance,” Powell told lawmakers.

The semiannual hearings, which will continue on Wednesday before the House Financial Services Committee, follow the Fed’s move into a new phase in its yearslong effort to tame price pressures. After lowering rates by a full percentage point last year, the Fed is in a holding pattern as it assesses how quickly to release its grip on the economy and ease borrowing costs.

Powell emphasized that conditions across the labor market “remain solid and appear to have stabilized.” That has given the central bank latitude to be patient about its next steps, especially since progress toward its 2% inflation goal has recently been bumpy.

“If the economy remains strong, and inflation does not continue to move sustainably toward 2%, we can maintain policy restraint for longer,” Powell said. “If the labor market were to weaken unexpectedly or inflation were to fall more quickly than anticipated, we can ease policy accordingly.”

The incoming inflation data have been slightly more reassuring, with price gains finally moderating in key sectors like housing. But sweeping proposals put forward by Trump that would affect immigration, tariffs and taxes have made the Fed’s job much more difficult.

SEC seeks to pause Binance litigation

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is seeking to pause its high-profile lawsuit against the cryptocurrency exchange Binance as the regulator tries to present itself as more crypto-friendly under a new administration.

Binance and the SEC filed a joint motion Monday asking for a 60-day stay in a lawsuit the regulator filed with significant fanfare two years ago under its previous chairman, Gary Gensler.

Monday’s filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said the SEC approached Binance asking for the pause. The regulator said the work of a new crypto task force launched by Acting Chairman Mark Uyeda that’s supposed to improve ties to the crypto industry “may impact and facilitate the potential resolution of this case.”

The filing is the first “tangible action in existing enforcement actions that recognizes a change in direction of the agency,” said Carol Goforth, a distinguished professor at the University of Arkansas School of Law.

Retailers beginning to limit egg sales

Not only are eggs expensive because of the ongoing bird flu outbreak. Now they are getting hard to find. And when stores do have eggs, consumers are starting to face limits on how many they can buy.

Eggs have become such a hot commodity that there have even been a couple of heists where thieves seem to be treating the yolks as if they were made out of gold.

The problem isn’t going away because the virus continues to mutate and infect more birds, other animals and some people. And anytime a chicken or turkey gets sick, the entire flock is slaughtered to help limit the spread.

The shortages tend to be isolated, so they might not be a problem at your store. But there’s no way to predict when a massive farm with millions of birds might get hit, and just one of those cases can cause supply problems.

Google’s calendar removes cultural events

Google’s online calendar has removed default references for a handful of holidays and cultural events — with users noticing that mentions of Pride and Black History Month, as well as other observances, no longer appear in their desktop and mobile applications.

The California-based tech giant said it manually added “a broader set of cultural moments in a wide number of countries” for several years, supplementing public holidays and national observances from timeanddate.com that have been used to populate Google Calendar for over a decade. Still, the company added, it received feedback about some other missing events and countries.

“Maintaining hundreds of moments manually and consistently globally wasn’t scalable or sustainable,” Google said in a statement sent to the Associated Press. “So in mid-2024 we returned to showing only public holidays and national observances from timeanddate.com globally, while allowing users to manually add other important moments.”

— News service reports