Jerome Powell Doesn’t Tweet Rocket Emojis
But it may not be long before the Fed does start to raise interest rates.
Rates aren’t headed this direction — yet. Photographer: Samuel Corum/Getty Images North America
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This week’s Federal Reserve meeting was considered the most important of Jerome Powell’s career. So just how worried is the Fed chair about the highest inflation reading in decades? Prices have been rising for housing, cars, baby diapers, even those fried-chicken sandwiches you all like so much. In fact, it seems like everything is going up except interest rates, which the Federal Open Market Committee once again left at — squints — nope, still can’t see them. That may soon begin to change, or not. Powell has managed to keep everyone guessing while his crew drops hints that they’re starting to feel a tad hawkish, Brian Chappatta writes. According to policy makers’ “dot plot” — a tarot card for investors — they now expect two interest-rate increases by the end of 2023, which is two more than they had expected as of March. The Fed’s statement also removed a key line about how the Covid-19 pandemic is wreaking havoc across the U.S. economy, because, well, it’s not really doing that anymore. That’s in large part to emergency measures taken by the Fed and Congress and even larger part to extraordinarily effective vaccines.