The Federal Reserve’s 25 basis-point increase in short-term interest rates pushed them above 1% for the first time since the 2008 financial crisis, and may still have been the central bank’s least intriguing move on Wednesday.
Trading in rate futures, after all, indicated a 90% chance of a hike before the June 14 session concluded, according to Bloomberg data.
What investors were more eager to receive — and didn’t really expect — was an update on how the Fed will wind down a balance sheet that ballooned to $4.5 trillion as it bought billions of dollars a month in government debt and mortgage-backed securities to buoy the economy after the crisis.
