Fed cuts rates, notes job market easing and solid economic growth

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By Howard Schneider

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Federal Reserve cut interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point on Thursday as policymakers took note of a job market that has “generally eased” while inflation continues to move towards the U.S. central bank’s 2% target.

“Economic activity has continued to expand at a solid pace,” the central bank’s rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee said at the end of a two-day policy meeting in which officials lowered the benchmark overnight interest rate to the 4.50%-4.75% range, as widely expected. The decision was unanimous.

But where the Fed’s previous policy statement noted slowing monthly job gains, the new one referred to the labor market more broadly.

Even while the unemployment rate remains low, “labor market conditions have generally eased,” the statement said.

Risks to the job market and inflation were “roughly in balance,” the Fed said, repeating language from the statement released after its September meeting.

The new statement also slightly altered the reference to inflation, saying that price pressures had “made progress” towards the Fed’s objective, rather than the prior language that it had “made further progress.” The personal consumption expenditures price index excluding food and energy items, a key gauge of inflation, has changed little in the last three months, running at a roughly 2.6% annual rate as of September.

Treasury yields trimmed losses and the yield curve flattened after the release of the policy statement. U.S. stock markets maintained their gains and the dollar slightly pared losses but was still down on the day. Futures markets priced in another quarter-percentage-point rate cut at the Fed’s final policy meeting of the year next month.

Omair Sharif, the president of Inflation Insights, said “the tweaks to the inflation language make this statement somewhat less dovish than the last one, and it looks like the Fed is cracking open the door to a December pause.”

The new statement also will be interpreted in light of Republican President-elect Donald Trump’s return to power in January.

Trump, who defeated Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in Tuesday’s presidential election, campaigned on promises ranging from steep tariffs on imports to a crackdown on immigration that could have a broad and unpredictable impact on the economic landscape the Fed will navigate in coming months as officials try to keep inflation contained and close to the central bank’s target.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell was appointed to lead the central bank by Trump during the Republican leader’s first term in the White House and then clashed with him over rates policy in 2018 and 2019.

Investors following Trump’s election victory have already trimmed their own bets that the Fed would be able to reduce interest rates as much as expected.