US markets end deeply in red following fed announcement

03 Nov 2022 Evaluate

The US markets ended sharply lower on Wednesday as traders reacted to the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy announcement and subsequent comments by Fed Chair Jerome Powell. The Fed announced its widely expected decision to raise interest rates by another 75 basis points. Citing efforts to achieve maximum employment and inflation at the rate of 2 percent over the longer run, the Fed announced its decision to raise the target range for the federal funds rate to 3.75 to 4 percent. The Fed also said that ongoing increases in rates will be appropriate in order to attain a stance of monetary policy that is sufficiently restrictive to return inflation to 2 percent over time. The central bank noted that future rate hikes will take into account the cumulative tightening of monetary policy, the lags with which monetary policy affects economic activity and inflation, and economic and financial developments.

The change in the language from the Fed comes following recent reports some officials are becoming increasingly uneasy about the pace of interest rate increases and the impact on the economy. Besides, comments from Fed Chair Jerome Powell tamped down optimism about the outlook for interest rates. Powell said It is very premature to be thinking about pausing. People when they hear lags think about a pause. he added It is very premature, in my view, to think about or be talking about pausing our rate hikes. We have a ways to go. On the sectoral front, significant weakness emerged among steel stocks, as reflected by the 4.8 percent plunge by the NYSE Arca Steel Index. Retail stocks also saw considerable weakness on the day, dragging the Dow Jones U.S. Retail Index down by 3.3 percent.

Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 505.44 points or 1.55 percent to 32,147.76, Nasdaq dropped 366.05 points or 3.36 percent to 10,524.8 and S&P 500 was down by 96.41 points 2.5 percent to 3,759.69.

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