What The Fed Lifting Interest Rates Means For The Markets

What The Fed Lifting Interest Rates Means For The Markets

On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve announced that it will begin lifting interest rates. Policymakers made the move to boost borrowing costs in a concerted effort to combat inflation. While announcements like these typically take a toll on markets—largely because they can impact consumer spending—this time, the markets are actually performing quite well. Download Q. ai for iOS for more investing content and access to over a dozen AI-powered investment strategies. Start with just $100 and never pay fees or commissions. The first interest rate hike since 2018 came after the two-day meeting this week. The boost of a quarter point was the first of many anticipated hikes to come—with as many as half a dozen more in 2022, plus another three or four in 2023. Inflation is high right now. Consumer prices are ticking up at their fastest rate in about 40 years. In fact, prices climbed 7. 9 percent in February compared to the previous year, according to a Consumer Price Index (CPI) report. It also marks the highest annualized growth rate in inflation since January 1982. The re-opening of the economy amid the ongoing COVID-19 crisis has driven pent-up consumer demand, wreaking havoc on the supply chain. Recently