The Bank of Japan kept ultra-low interest rates on Friday but decided to start trimming its huge bond purchases in a slow but steady retreat from its massive monetary stimulus. While it will continue to buy government bonds at the current pace of roughly 6 trillion yen ($38 billion) per month, the central bank decided … Read more
Cut stimulus, and say goodbye to the stock market’s armor. That’s been the bet for a decade. Now the moment has come. But no signs of catastrophe have arisen. Bulls can thank the stagecraft of Jerome Powell, the Federal Reserve chairman, who on Friday gave the strongest signal yet that the central bank will begin … Read more
Federal Reserve officials expected to continue to make progress on reaching its threshold to scaling back their massive asset purchases, a record of their June gathering showed. “The Committee’s standard of ‘substantial further progress’ was generally seen as not having yet been met, though participants expected progress to continue,” according to minutes from the June … Read more