The Financial Post reports in its Friday, April 19, edition that the current economic situation is being referred to as "reflation desperation" by Goldman Sachs. A Financial Times dispatch to the Post reports that it is going to be a difficult time for policy-makers and investors that will likely last for a while. The reason for this is that inflation, which was thought to have been defeated last year, is now making a comeback. This has caused concern because there have been three consecutive U.S. consumer price index inflation readings, which cannot be ignored. Although the increases have been small and not the preferred measure of inflation for the U.S. Federal Reserve, they are still significant, especially when combined with the recent U.S. retail sales data. As a result, the expectation for rate cuts has decreased significantly. At the beginning of the year, there was an expectation for six or seven rate cuts in the United States for this year, but now only one or two are expected. Bank of America has shoved back its call for the first Fed cut from June all the way out to December, a huge jump for a tweak that typically moves in increments of one or two months at a time.