But because we also anticipate that the factors that are currently holding down the neutral rate will diminish somewhat over time, additional gradual rate hikes are likely to be appropriate over the next few years to sustain the economic expansion and return inflation to our 2 percent goal.
Last year, economic output in BIS central bankers’ speeches  1  Russia declined by 3.7%, for example, and by 3.8% in Brazil. In many of these countries, the boom in commodity prices, which continued up until 2012, masked the structural weaknesses in the economies concerned, which are now all the more apparent.