Slashed.
The Federal Reserve lowered its benchmark interest rate by half of a percentage point this afternoon, starting the next phase of the policy cycle with a bang. Officials are squarely focused on a slowing U.S. labor market, with inflation still too high but closing in on the central bank’s 2% annual target.
The Federal Open Market Committee now has a new target range for the federal-funds rate of 4.75% to 5%, after holding rates steady since July 2023.
Market pricing was all over the place in the week before the meeting, with odds shifting between quarter- and half-point reductions. The bigger move is an effort to front-load cuts and get ahead of further weakening in the jobs market.
The median estimate in the latest so-called "dot plot" implies a fed-funds rate target range of 4.25% to 4.5% at the end of 2024. That’s a bit less easing than markets were anticipating, but it's significantly lower than the Fed’s previous forecast: In June, the median 2024 forecast was for a target range of 5.0% to 5.25%.
Interest-rate futures remain a bit ahead of that, pricing in the greatest odds of the target falling to 4.0% to 4.25% this year. That would require another 0.75 percentage point of cumulative cuts at the FOMC's November and December meetings.
Considering the stakes, markets had a relatively muted reaction to the news today. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite each fell 0.3%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped by 0.2%. Bond yields rose slightly.
Comments