Author: News Room

The Federal Reserve held its key interest rate steady Wednesday for the fifth consecutive meeting, as the central bank awaits more data to determine when to cut rates. The Fed has raised rates aggressively over the past two years in a bid to fight the highest inflation in decades. But while Americans continue to deal with high interest rates and inflation, Fed officials are still not ready to bring down borrowing costs. Wall Street is betting that the first rate cut will come in the summer. Fed officials are facing the difficult task of balancing the risk of cutting too soon with the risk of cutting too late — both of which come with consequences.…

GBP/USD sees a significant uptick, navigating the 1.2700/1.2750 range following the Federal Reserve’s rate decision. Fed holds interest rates steady, with an emphasis on the ongoing strength of the US economy and labor market. Despite high recent inflation, Fed’s projections for 2024 remain stable; slight adjustment made for 2025 FFR outlook. The GBP/USD climbed sharply after the Federal Reserve’s (Fed) decision to hold rates but kept their interest rate cut projections unchanged for 2024. Consequently, the Greenback tumbled, while US Treasury bond yields climbed. At the time of writing, the GBP/USD trades volatile in the 1.2700/1.2750 area ahead of Fed…

The highlights of the final day of the Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit in London? Lots of politics and regulation talk, plus a four-legged guest. More than 1,500 crypto professionals, traditional finance executives and global legislators descended upon the Hilton London Metropole this week to hear from the leading voices in finance and crypto. The third and final day of the conference started off with a bang Wednesday morning when the discussion turned to the upcoming US presidential election. “I will fight Donald Trump, toe to toe, until the election,” Anthony Scaramucci, founder and managing partner of SkyBridge, told a packed…

The Federal Reserve on Wednesday held interest rates steady as expected and signaled it still plans multiple cuts before the end of the year.Following its two-day policy meeting, the central bank’s rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee said it will keep its benchmark overnight borrowing rate in a range between 5.25%-5.5%, where it has held since July 2023.Along with the decision, Fed officials penciled in three quarter-percentage point cuts by the end of 2024, which would be the first reductions since the early days of the Covid pandemic in March 2020.The current federal funds rate level is the highest in more…

House Speaker Mike Johnson is considering inviting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Congress after House members raised the idea in their closed-door conference meeting Wednesday morning. “It’s one of the things that we have in mind, and we may try to arrange for that,” Johnson told reporters when asked about inviting Netanyahu to address Congress. “I think it’s very important for us to show solidarity and support for Israel right now in their time of great struggle, and we certainly stand for that position, and we’ll try to advance that in every way that we can.” Johnson said he…

FC Barcelona striker Robert Lewandowski claimed to be in better physical shape than 10 years ago and also shed light on his attempts to get outgoing head coach Xavi Hernandez to prolong his tenure in the hotseat during a talk with TV3. Though roaring out of the traps when he initially joined the Catalans from Bayern Munich, Lewandowski has been criticized since returning from the Qatar 2022 World Cup. Many felt that Father Time had caught up with the 35-year-old, whose form slumped. In recent weeks, however, ‘Lewy’ has shown a vast improvement with a series of important strikes in…

While the large-stock-dominated, capitalization-weighted market averages generally are off to a nice start in 2024, the median returns for members of the Russell 3000 index, the Russell 3000 Value index and the Russell 3000 Growth index are in the red year-to-date, as many of the smaller constituents have been big laggards, suggesting to me that these and other companies that have missed the rally have plenty of upside potential. Indeed, the Russell 3000 Value index remains near its lowest relative value ever versus the Russell 3000 Growth index. With many worried that equities are expensively priced with the major market…

Other pressing conflicts are losing critical and necessary attention as the world’s scrutiny is hyper-focused on the war in Gaza. This is particularly evident concerning Syria and its peoples’ democracy movement, which has experienced new life in the form of pro-democracy protests in the southern governorate of Suwayda. The United Nations needs to take this into consideration and engage these protestors as it works towards resolving the 13-year-old conflict – something it appears to be missing thus far.Indeed, while many have called for a renewed, innovative approach to the Syrian conflict that supports the democratic aspirations of the Syrian people, stakeholders like the United Nations appear…

The US has an 85% chance of avoiding a recession in the next year, according to Jan Hatzius. The chief economist of Goldman Sachs pointed to resilient growth in the US economy. The odds of a recession have fallen to what they are any given year, he estimated. The US will most likely avoid a hard landing in the next year, according to Goldman Sachs’ Jan Hatzius.Speaking to CNN on Wednesday, the chief economist of the investment bank estimated the US has now just 15% chance of tipping into a recession in the next twelve months. That would be considered…

The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady on Wednesday.Fed Chair Powell previously said it’ll take more positive economic data before he starts cutting rates.Still, some Democratic lawmakers want a timeline for when the relief will come this year. Interest rate cuts aren’t coming for Americans just yet.On Wednesday, the Federal Open Market Committee announced it would continue its pause on interest rate increases in its second meeting of 2024. In line with predictions, this move came after the Consumer Price Index, which measures inflation, rose 3.2% year-over-year in February — above the 3.1% January reading and the Fed’s 2% inflation…