ফেড সরকারী তথ্য অনুপস্থিত. এটি কি স্বল্প মেয়াদে সুদের হার কমানোর পরিকল্পনাকে প্রভাবিত করবে?
The Federal Reserve is widely expected to cut its benchmark short-term interest rate for the second time this year on Wednesday, despite the increasingly cloudy outlook for the economy it’s trying to influence. The government shutdown has choked off the flow of data that the Fed relies on to track employment, inflation, and the broader economy. The September jobs report, which was due to be released three weeks ago, is delayed. This month’s employment figures, due out November 7, will likely be delayed and could be less comprehensive when finally released. The White House said last week that the October inflation report will not be released at all. The drying up of data raises the stakes for the Federal Reserve as it widely anticipates continuing to cut interest rates in an effort to support growth and employment. Fed officials indicated at their last meeting in September that they were likely to implement interest rate cuts in October and December, and financial markets now consider a cut in December all but certain. But if job gains accelerate soon, the Fed might not detect that shift. If there is an employment rebound following weak job gains in the summer, then further interest rate cuts may not be warranted. On Tuesday, ADP, a payroll processor, released a new weekly measure of hiring by companies, using payroll data from millions of customers. It shows that in late September and earlier this month, companies resumed adding jobs, after cutting back in July and August. However, the main reason for cutting interest rates is that most Fed officials view the key interest rate, now about 4.1%, as high enough to restrain economic growth. Under this view, the Fed can cut several times before reaching a level that might provide unnecessary stimulus to the economy. According to Labor Department data, before the government shutdown choked off the data flow on October 1, monthly job gains had weakened to an average of just 29,000 in the previous three months. The unemployment rate had edged up from a low of 4.2% in July to 4.3% in August. Meanwhile, last week’s inflation report — released more than a week late because of the lockdown — showed that inflation remains elevated but is not accelerating and may not require high interest rates to control. The government’s first report on economic growth for the July-September quarter was due out Thursday, but will be postponed, as will Friday’s consumer spending report. That includes the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation. Fed officials say that they are monitoring a range of other data, including some from the private sector, and don’t feel hampered by the lack of government reports. Also on Wednesday, the central bank may announce that it will no longer reduce the size of its vast holdings of securities, which ballooned during and after the pandemic and after the 2008-2009 Great Recession. The change over time could slightly lower long-term interest rates on things like mortgages but may not significantly affect consumer borrowing costs. The Fed bought nearly $5 trillion of Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities from 2020 to 2022 to stabilize financial markets and keep long-term interest rates low during the pandemic. The bond purchases brought its stock holdings to $9 trillion. When a central bank buys Treasury bonds, for example, it pays for them with newly created money that is credited to the reserve accounts that banks maintain at the Fed. But over the past three years, the Fed has reduced its holdings to about $6.6 trillion. To reduce its holdings, the Fed allows securities to mature without replacing them, which reduces banks’ reserves. The risk is that if the Fed reduces its holdings significantly, short-term interest rates could rise as banks borrow money to replenish their reserves. In 2019, the Fed was reducing its balance sheet and was caught off guard by a sharp, unexpected rise in short-term interest rates that disrupted financial markets, an outcome it wants to avoid this time. The Fed is currently reducing its holdings of mortgage-backed securities by up to $35 billion a month and Treasury securities by just $5 billion a month. Powell said two weeks ago that the Fed would consider ending the decline “in coming months,” but analysts now expect that it will happen sooner because of recent signs that bank reserves are running low. -Christopher Rugaber, AP Economics Writer
প্রকাশিত: 2025-10-29 18:54:00
উৎস: www.fastcompany.com
