An interest rate rise is continuing to lurk around the corner.
The release of the Federal Reserve meeting minutes from last month showed that the Fed doesn’t expect to raise rates at their June meeting, reports Bloomberg. Despite agreement that the first quarter’s economic slowdown won’t continue, many participants “thought it unlikely that the data available in June would provide sufficient confirmation that the conditions for raising the target range for the federal funds rate had been satisfied,” according to minutes of the April 28-29 Federal Open Market Committee meeting released Wednesday.
“Moderate” economic growth is expected in the coming months, but the Fed remains concerned about consumer spending. The continued line is that rates will rise when there is further improvement in the labor market and the Fed is “reasonably confident” inflation will move back up. Officials also rejected the idea of giving the public “an explicit indication” of when a rate increase is imminent. Writes Bloomberg:
“There’s nothing in the minutes saying anything other than they are staying at zero,” said Joseph Lavorgna, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. in New York. “I don’t come away from these minutes any more confident they’re raising rates in September.”
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