Tag Archives: Federal Reserve System

After weeks of bluster and escalation, President Trump blinked. Then he blinked again. And again. He backed off his threat to fire the Federal Reserve chairman. His Treasury secretary, acutely aware that the S&P 500 was down 10 percent since Mr. Trump was inaugurated, signaled he was looking for an offramp to avoid an intensifying trade war with China. And …

Federal Reserve officials have had one clear message since President Trump sharply escalated the global trade war this month. Keeping inflation expectations in check as price pressures rise is their No. 1 priority. On Friday, they faced a big setback. A new survey released by the University of Michigan found that as consumer sentiment took another nosedive because of fears …

The bedrock of the financial system trembled on Friday, with government bond yields rising sharply as the chaotic rollout of tariffs shook investors’ faith in the pivotal role played by the United States in the financial system. U.S. government bonds, known as Treasuries because they are issued by the U.S. Treasury, are backed by the full faith of the American …

President Trump’s global tariffs have sent stock markets worldwide into a tailspin, and the S&P 500 on Wednesday was close to tumbling into bear market territory. Mr. Trump has seemed unmoved by the decline, signaling that he has no plans to back off on tariffs, insisting that they would bring in “billions of dollars” in revenue and that other countries …

President Trump’s global tariffs have sent stock markets worldwide into a tailspin, and the S&P 500 on Monday entered bear market territory for the first time since 2022. Mr. Trump has seemed unmoved by the decline. He signaled on Monday that he had no plans to back off on tariffs, insisting that they would bring in “billions of dollars” in …

For three years, the U.S. economy has been buffeted by rapid inflation, high interest rates and political instability at home and abroad. Yet it has proved surprisingly resilient, supported by the sturdy pillars of robust consumer spending, a rising stock market, and healthy balance sheets for households and businesses alike. But one by one, those pillars have begun to crack …

Until a few months ago, the Federal Reserve appeared close to achieving something that many doubted was possible. The economy looked on the cusp of a “soft landing,” a situation where inflation was headed back to the central bank’s 2 percent target without a recession. That put the central bank on track to steadily lower interest rates until borrowing costs …

Americans hoping for some relief on inflation suffered a setback in February, as new data showed underlying price pressures intensifying even before the latest escalation in President Trump’s trade war and consumers pulled back on spending. The Personal Consumption Expenditures price index, after stripping out volatile food and energy items, climbed 2.8 percent in February from a year earlier, outpacing …

The Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged on Wednesday for a second straight meeting. The March meeting was the central bank’s most direct acknowledgment to date that President Trump’s policies are set to have a real impact on the economy, stoking significant uncertainty about where inflation, growth and — ultimately — interest rates are headed. Here are the takeaways: Tariffs …

The Federal Reserve is expected to keep its key rate steady on Wednesday, after a series of cuts that lowered rates by a full percentage point last year. That means consumers looking to borrow are likely to have to wait a bit longer for better deals on many loans, but savers will benefit from steadier yields on savings accounts. Economists …