we will hear from patrick harker. this is bloomberg. ♪ shery: this is bloomberg markets: balance of power. i'm shery ahn. david: i'm david westin. we turn to mark crumpton for bloomberg news. >> peter strzok's testified for the first time on capitol hill about disparaging text messages he allegedly made about then candidate donald trump during the 2016 campaign. his appearance before a house judiciary committee comes as republicans have demanded test my from former fbi lawyer lisa page after she failed to comply with his subpoena. struck and patriots ridley had an affair -- page reportedly had an affair and texted on their work cell phones including disparaging comments about trump. is in london. he has a formal dinner planned tonight at the ancestral home of winston churchill. tomorrow he meets with theresa may and then the queen. may is expected to reinforce the idea of a u.s. u.k. special alliance. there will also be a demonstration of how british and u.s. special fork is -- forces would handle a terrorist attack.

what is the message from jay powell and patrick harker and is it backed by the inflation data?athleen: let's start with jerome powell. he did in interview on npr public radio, asked about growth, inflation, trade. he does see the economy in "a good place" and is concerned with trade policy. he said this is a new process and its "difficult to predict how it turns out." michael mckee sat down with patrick harker today and he told bloomberg he's comfortable with inflation as high as 2.5%. that would be considerably above the 2% target. nonetheless, he's in no hurry to hike faster. let's hear what he told michael mckee. >> at the beginning of the year, i put in three for this year, three for next year. i have not moved off of that. let's look at the consumer price index. month on month, 0.1%, weaker than forecasts, something to do with energy prices. the core of 0.2%. year-over-year rate we watch closely. let's jump into the bloomberg library. what you can see is that the cpi actually hit 2.9% on the headline and that was the fastest since 2012. energy prices have come back. you've

economy and talk with patrick harker. bloomberg. ♪ matt: former foreign secretary boersma johnson would make a great prime minister area china's monthly trade surplus hits a record and the fed warns tariffs could be harmful to growth as well area markets ignore the politics. europe trades higher after a positive session in asia. u.s. futures are in the green as well. good morning, welcome area i'm here at europeans headquarters -- at the european headquarters in london. let's take a look at how things are shaping up as far as individual movers. ayes earlier,ut h it's up. showing ar phone also decent gain but it's a volatile stock. most of the losers were looking at our off. almost 500 of the stoxx 600 are gaining so it's interesting to see which ones are down. metro is off 1.5%. siemens health and ears is off 1.8%. none of these stocks, interestingly enough, our ex dividend. we talked about holding -- we talked about gam holdings down almost 8%. we go to sebastian. >> u.s. president donald trump has dealt a double blow to

from patrick harker.

switch gears and get to patrick harker. our own michael mckee sat down with him. he says in regards to inflation, he is comfortable. even at as high as 2.5%. that would be well above the 2% target. let's hear what he said earlier. >> i had put in three for this year and next year. i have not moved off of that although i am open to an increase this year if we start to see inflation accelerated. kathleen: he is not rushing to raise rates even more this year the consumer price index report is closed to watch today. bloomberg into the now, because what is important to most people is the year-over-year rate. what you can see here is the headline, up to 2.9%. we had a higher brent, which is an imputed number. gas prices falling. -- since fastest cinch 2012. highest rate, you see upward pressure on consumer prices. a put 2% there but i have point to make and that is the 2% target does not refer to cbi, it refers to the pce deflator, this .ore line -- this blue line the main number just under that 2%. and thata sweet spot is why jay powell said he is not ready to declare