What to Make Out of Fed Minutes

What was the most disappointing element in the Fed minutes last night was that the Fed minutes didn't indicate that the committee members are of the mind frame of lowering the interest rate this year as well once they have reached the peak of the interest rate cycle.

This piece of information is highly important to pay attention to as traders are largely priced in that the Fed will begin the process of cutting the interest rate this year as it will not risk the economy going into a deep recession.

The minutes said "participants generally observed that maintaining a restrictive policy stance for a sustained period until inflation is clearly on a path toward 2 percent is appropriate from a risk-management perspective."

They also stated:

"A number of participants emphasized that it would be important to clearly communicate that a slowing in the pace of rate increases was not an indication of any weakening of the Committee's resolve to achieve its price-stability goal or a judgment that inflation was already on a persistent downward path".

So, now one thing which is pretty much crystal from the event last night is that it will be wrong to think that the Fed will begin the process of interest rate cuts this year.

More importantly, the risk of a policy mistake taking place is once again sky-high as the Fed is once again stubborn with its approach and not much concerned about the economy. Their monetary policy is bound to slow down the US economy and the slowdown is highly likely to be a significant one which the Fed doesn't believe.