Economics
Federal Reserve Rate Hike: Who Wins, Who Loses, Who Goes Meh
- No surprise on `liftoff,' but some alarm on who takes beating
- Other central banks, corporate bonds among the winners
Fed Liftoff Highlights U.S. Economy's Strength
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Janet Yellen and the Federal Open Market Committee have finally taken the world’s biggest economy off life support. Now, U.S. government deficits will rise, insurance companies will get relief and savers -- who’ve weathered years of earning next to nothing -- will continue to survive on crumbs.
The rate hike comes as no surprise, but it’s new territory nonetheless. Investment bankers, traders and analysts who were in business school back in December 2008 when then-Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke began the journey known as ZIRP, for zero-interest-rate policy, are now in their 30s, their entire careers spent in what current Fed Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer called “far from normal” times.