The Federal Reserve’s (FED) officials are looking for signs. That its recent round of hikes in interest rates is having an impact on inflation.

Consumer price index (CPI) for month fell to 6.4% versus 6.5% for December, marking the seventh consecutive month of sluggish growth

The core result for the year-over-year period. Which excludes volatile goods like food and energy, came out at 5.6%, low from 5.7% with in previous month.

The federal reserve has aggressively increased interest rates from near-zero to the range from between 4.5% – 4.75% in even less than a year.

This tightness has raised hopes that U.S. economy could be able to avoid a recession even as high rates threaten to slow down output.

These factors include indications that inflation has peaked and is gradually ebbing backwards to the Fed’s target rate of 2%. Officials from the Fed have cautioned that this result is indeed far from certain.