This story has been updated with remarks from Fed officials. The Federal Reserve hiked its benchmark interest rate for the 10th time on Wednesday in what analysts predict could be the last rise for now in the central bank's fight against inflation. The Fed signaled that a pause could be possible after 14 months of rate hikes, the AP reports. The quarter-point rise announced Wednesday brings the rate to a range of 5% to 5.25%, the highest in 16 years.
In a break from previous policy statements, Fed officials did not say further rate hikes might be appropriate, the Wall Street Journal reports. Instead, they said they would monitor developments to determine "the extent to which additional policy firming may be appropriate to return inflation to 2% over time." They suggested future changes could be decreases, not increases, per the Journal.
Inflation dropped from 9.1% in June to 5% in March, but it is still far above the Fed's target. "Inflation pressures continue to run high, and the process of getting getting inflation back down to 2% has a long way to go," Fed Chair Jerome Powell said Wednesday. Some analysts had argued for the Fed to declare a pause in rate hikes, noting that economic growth fell to 1.1% year-on-year in the first quarter of this year and another rise could push the economy into recession. "A decline in economic growth to 1.1% shows it is time for the Fed to pause,” Clinton administration economic adviser Robert J. Shapiro said before the decision, per the Guardian.
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"There is a significant lag between interest rate rises being imposed and them taking effect, and so we know there is more pain for the economy to come even without further rate rises," Shapiro said. Elsa Lignos at RBC Capital Markets, however, argued that a "shock pause" would "do more harm than good" by unsettling markets with a surprise move, the New York Times reports. (More Federal Reserve stories.)
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