WASHINGTON (REUTERS) - Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen was likely just repeating the views of private analysts and investors when she said the central bank could raise interest rates six months after ending a bond-buying program, a top policymaker said on Friday.

"On the 'considerable period' being six months, the surveys that I had seen from the private sector had that kind of number penciled in," St Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard said during a lunch with journalists. "

That wasn't very different from what we had heard from financial markets. So, I just think she's just repeating that." Bullard's remarks were the first by a Fed policymaker since Ms Yellen made her comments on Wednesday.