Newsroom

October 29, 2014

FOMC ends asset purchase program

As expected, the Federal Open Market Committee issued a policy statement announcing the end of the Federal Reserve's asset purchase program following the close of its two-day meeting Wednesday.

The FOMC stated that it would maintain its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency-backed securities and of rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction.

NAFCU Chief Economist and Director of Research Curt Long said "As expected, the FOMC announced an end to the asset purchase program. Now there is nothing to distract attention from the federal funds rate. While the committee did not provide any clues on the expected date of the first hike in interest rates, they will be expected to do so in the coming months, possibly as early as their next meeting in mid-December. Overall, the tone of the statement was noticeably more upbeat, but still stressed concerns over low inflation."

The committee repeated its earlier language about keeping its 0 to 0.25 percent target range for the federal funds rates for "a considerable time" following the wrap-up of the purchasing program. However, the committee changed its previous characterization of the "significant underutilization" of labor market resources to a comment that the underutilization of resources is "gradually diminishing."