The US Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged after its first rate-setting meeting of the year on Wednesday, resisting enormous pressure from the White House to lower rates. The FOMC has 12 voting members and meets just eight times a year to set interest rates. Cutting interest rates can spur short-term economic activity, though at the risk of pushing up prices in the long term. But Trump has claimed that the Fed not lowering interest rates costs the US economy “hundreds of billions of dollars”. After the Fed meeting, Trump called Powell “stiff” and said that the rate drop “could have been doubled”.