A weekend piece in the Financial Times says a "key question is whether the Fed will feel any compulsion to formally signal a looming move in this week's statement".
The Federal Reserve's Federal Open Market Committee meet Tuesday and Wednesday this week
- There are nearly no expectations of a policy change (rate hike 'lift off' this at this meeting)
- Yellen and other members of the Committee have been non-committal on specific dates
- This is likely to be the case again
The FT goes on:
- Since the June meeting the domestic economy has shown renewed signs of strength
- Sales of existing houses are running at their strongest pace since 2007
- Credit is becoming more freely available
- Official GDP data due on Thursday "are tipped to show annualised growth of around 2.5 per cent for the second quarter, confirming signs of solid, if unspectacular, progress"
- Meanwhile, jobs market progress continues unabated, with initial claims for jobless benefits last week falling to their lowest level since 1973
- Inflation is more uncertain
And ...
Complicating the picture is an inadvertent leak of Fed staff economic forecasts that suggested the central bank's own economists are less optimistic about the economy than the FOMC itself.
(More on the 'leak' here)
