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Fed's Lacker again says strong case for June hike as inflation firms

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) - With inflation firming and an economy set to rebound from a weak first quarter, there is a strong case for raising interest rates in June, a top Federal Reserve official said on Tuesday.

Richmond Fed President Jeffrey Lacker repeated his view that the U.S. central bank should consider hiking in June, though he stressed that he has not made his mind up yet and that he will continue to assess incoming data.

Lacker, who is a voting member this year on the Fed's policy-setting committee, attributed first-quarter weakness to transitory factors and said inflation was heading toward the Fed's 2 percent target, helped in part by rebounding oil prices.

"What I've said is that a case might be strong in June. I still think that's possible. But as I said think, I haven't made up my mind about June," Lacker said to reporters after giving a speech at Louisiana State University

(Reporting by Michael Flaherty; Editing by Leslie Adler)