Tag Archives: Fed dot chart

Policy makers’ forecast for rate hikes this year likely to be raised, but central bank will be much more cautious on view further out.The Federal Reserve’s 12-13 June meeting takes place amid a strong economic backdrop at home, and the Fed is unlikely to hesitate about hiking rates by another quarter-point to a range of 1.75-2.00% this week. The US labour market is particularly solid: the unemployment rate dropped to 3.8% in May, the lowest rate since April 2000. The three-month average gain...

After a solid February job report, we continue to expect four Fed rate hikes this year (and two in 2019).There are two main conclusions to be drawn from the February US employment report. First, the US economy’s underlying momentum is particularly robust, consistent with our view that GDP growth will pick up to 3.0% this year, from 2.3% in 2017. Second, while the labour market is tight, there is still some slack left; in other words, the US labour market is not (yet) overheating.That...

The Fed remains upbeat on growth and its members may be tempted to raise their rate expectations.Fed Chair Jerome Powell highlighted continuity with Janet Yellen’s monetary policy in his testimony before Congress today.He highlighted “positive developments” since the December meeting. This could be a hint that an additional rate hike could be in the pipeline (The Fed indicated three rate hikes in the December dot plot).Reading between the lines, it remains clear that the Powell Fed will not...

In line with our expectations, the Fed announced 'normalisation' of its balance sheet at its September meeting. Our scenario for a December Fed rate hike remains unchanged.As widely expected, the Federal Reserve announced at its 20 September meeting the start of the ‘normalisation’ of its balance sheet; some of its bond holdings will not be reinvested from October on. The Fed’s balance sheet should therefore start to shrink gradually. Fed chair Janet Yellen justified this decision by saying...

As it prepares to announce a partial shrinkage of its balance sheet this week, the question is how firmly the Fed signals the next rate hike.The Fed is widely expected to announce a partial shrinkage of its balance sheet at its 20 September meeting, in line with the guidance it provided in June.We also expect Yellen to point to the possibility of another rate hike soon (while remaining vague about the exact timing), dependent on further improvements in inflation. This should be backed by the...

A generally more cautious Fed emerged from its 14-15 June meeting. We continue to expect just one Fed rate hike in 2016, probably in September Read full report hereFollowing a very weak job report for May, and just one week before the EU referendum in the UK, it should be no surprise that the Fed is in no rush to tighten monetary policy, or to send a strong signal about the timing of the next rate hike. Indeed the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) statement struck a more cautious tone,...