WASHINGTON, April 26 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, the Federal Reserve's preferred inflation measure, ticked up to 2.7 percent in March, as inflation pressures continue, the Commerce Department reported on Friday.

The latest figure came after the measure slowed to 2.5 percent year on year in January from 2.6 percent in December 2023, remained at 2.5 percent in February, according to the Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis.

The PCE gauge takes into account how consumers change their behavior in light of higher prices, and is a broader measure of consumer behavior than the Consumer Price Index (CPI).

The so-called core PCE price index, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, rose 2.8 percent in March from a year ago, following a 2.8 percent increase in February and 2.9 percent increase in January. The measure is well above the Fed's inflation target of 2 percent.

Twelve-month core PCE inflation peaked at 5.6 percent in February 2022.

U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) slowed significantly to an annual rate of 1.6 percent in the first quarter amid stubborn inflation that shows no sign of abating, according to data released by the Commerce Department on Thursday.

Desmond Lachman, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a former official at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), told Xinhua that Thursday's "disappointing" GDP numbers raise questions about whether the Fed has achieved a soft landing, in which growth remains strong and inflation comes back down to the Fed's 2-percent target.

Instead, the numbers suggest "that maybe we will have stagflation with weak economic growth yet inflation remaining above the Fed's target," Lachman said.

The Fed has made an effort to bring inflation down to its 2-percent mandate by raising interest rates since March 2022. Markets, businesses and possible homeowners want to see interest rates come down.

U.S. Fed Chair Jerome Powell recently signaled that policymakers would wait longer than previously anticipated to cut rates following higher-than-expected inflation readings, which means monetary easing won't come until later this year.

The higher-than-expected inflation numbers "make it very unlikely that the Fed will cut interest rates at either of its next two policy meetings," Lachman said. Enditem

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