Federal Reserve minutes: Officials warn of inflation risks or force interest rates to rise, AI investment becomes new variable According to Golden Finance, on July 9th, Federal Reserve officials unanimously decided at their meeting on June 16-17 to maintain the benchmark interest rate in the range of 3.5% to 3.75%. The interest rate range has remained unchanged since December last year, and the policy statement has also removed all hints about the direction of future policy adjustments. The meeting minutes released early Thursday morning Beijing time showed that officials did not form a single judgment on the subsequent policy path. If inflation remains high this year, raising interest rates will be seen as a necessary choice; If price pressure quickly eases, interest rates can also remain unchanged. The core issue determining the next step is how long the current force pushing up prices will last. The differences reflected in the minutes mainly focus on how the future prospects will change, rather than whether immediate action must be taken at the June meeting. This three week delayed release of the minutes shows that decision-makers' concerns about the inflation outlook are deepening. According to written records, the investment boom in artificial intelligence, along with the Middle East conflict and tariff policies, is seen as a factor that may keep prices high and prompt the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates. A few months ago, AI infrastructure investment was hardly a key source of inflation in discussions at the Federal Reserve. Nowadays, multiple officials have mentioned that the surge in data center construction and computing power spending has become a new source of demand, and the economic supply capacity is becoming tight. The minutes state: "Several attendees commented that price pressure has become more widespread, with most goods and services experiencing significant increases." More officials believe that strong business investment driven by AI infrastructure may become a new force to maintain price pressure.