Despite ‘Downside Risks,’ Federal Reserve Cuts Key Interest Rate and Signals More Cuts On the Way

The Federal Reserve cut a key interest rate by a quarter point on Wednesday to a target range of 4 to 4.25 percent and indicated two more cuts could be on the table for the rest of the year. Critics of the Fed, however, say it’s too little, too late.The vote to lower the rate was 11-1, with the newest member, Stephen Miran, an appointee of President Trump, preferring a larger, half percent rate cut.The Federal Funds Rate had been in a target range of 4.25 to 4.50 percent since last December. The new rate is the lowest level in nearly three years.Fed members showed diverging opinions on the ideal path forward during this week’s policy meetings. Seven of the 12 voting members of the board signaled that they would support two more rate cuts this year, but seven of the 19 meeting participants expected no additional cuts this year.“There’s no risk-free path,” the Fed chairman, Jerome Powell, said at a press conference after the rate cut announcement. Mr. Powell repeatedly referred to “downside risks” to the American economy.A post-meeting statement by the Fed also warned that “uncertainty about the economic outlook remains elevated.”Economic activity has moderated and the labor market is cooling, but inflation remains elevated above the Fed’s targeted 2 percent. In its economic forecast, policymakers said they expect inflation to increase next year.“The Fed is rather in a quandary,” the editor of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, James Grant, tells the Sun.“So, it fell to the chairman how to get out of it. And he figures that one quarter of one percent is going to satisfy his constituencies,” Mr. Grant says.Lower interest rates generally encourage borrowing, which stimulates the economy, but the quarter-point cut will likely only bring minimal help to credit card borrowers and those seeking auto loans.“It means very little to consumers. The expectations of further rate cuts is what is most meaningful,” Mr. Grant says. “Oftentimes, with regard to the Fed, it is not what they do, it’s the hope of what they will do.”Mr. Powell has come under relentless pressure from Mr. Trump for months to cut interest rates. The president has repeatedly referred to the chairman as “Jerome ‘Too Late’ Powell” in his social media posts on the topic.A former World Bank president, David Malpass, calls it a token cut and agrees that it should have been larger. He tells the Sun that the Fed is falling further behind the curve by delaying larger cuts.“The Fed should strengthen its commitment to price stability, full employment, and defending the dollar,” Mr. Malpass says. “This will allow lower interest rates and bond yields. Interest rates are higher than necessary because of the Fed’s indifference to the dollar.”The Federal Reserve has two more meetings this year, one in October and a final one in December.

Despite ‘Downside Risks,’ Federal Reserve Cuts Key Interest Rate and Signals More Cuts On the Way

Despite ‘Downside Risks,’ Federal Reserve Cuts Key Interest Rate and Signals More Cuts On the Way

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