By Eric Revell | Fox Business
The Federal Reserve on Tuesday begins a highly anticipated two-day meeting where policymakers are expected to cut interest rates for the first time in four years as stubborn inflation shows signs of continuing to ease.
The Fed’s policymaking arm, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), kicks off its meeting on Tuesday and will announce its decision regarding interest rates on Wednesday, when Fed Chair Jerome Powell will also shed light on the central bank’s thinking at a press conference.
After its last policy meeting in July, the Fed kept its benchmark federal funds rate steady at a 23-year-high range of 5.25% to 5.5% but opened the door to interest rate cuts if inflation continued to ease. Inflation data showed that price growth slowed to 2.9% year over year in July and last week’s release of August data reflected a continuation of that trend, with headline inflation at 2.5% from a year ago.