FYI: Central bank says taper of the balance sheet runoff to begin in May and end in September.
Federal Reserve officials, seeing slower growth and softer inflation ahead, said Wednesday they don’t expect to hike interest rates much at all over the next three years.
The new median forecast of Fed officials in the “dot-plot” graph was for no more interest-rate hike this year. The central bankers see one move in 2020. The prior Fed forecast was for two rate hikes this year and then one more next year.
Policy makers also announced they will begin to taper the runoff of the $4 trillion balance sheet in May and end it in September.
The Fed said in a statement after its two-day meeting that it was holding its benchmark rate between 2.25% and 2.5%. Policy makers repeated they could be “patient” about what further “adjustments” to make to interest rates.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/fed-seeing-slower-growth-and-softer-inflation-now-projects-no-rate-hikes-this-year-2019-03-20/print
