Minutes from the Federal Reserve's September policy meeting reflect unanimous agreement among officials that interest rates needed to be higher to combat persistent inflation.
"Participants generally emphasized that inflation remained elevated while the labor market appeared to be near full employment, with some signs of strengthening, and that economic activity was expanding at a solid pace. Furthermore, almost all participants ****** sed that, while inflation risks were tilted to the upside, risks to the labor market had diminished and were now broadly balanced," minutes from the Sept. 16 meeting released Wednesday stated.
"Based on the outlook and the changing balance of risks, all participants viewed a higher target range for the federal funds rate as appropriate."
The Fed voted unanimously on Sept. 16 to raise rates, the first hike in three years. And at the time, most Federal Open Market Committee members saw a need for at least one more 25 basis point rate hike this year.
Markets were banking on a hike and expecting more to come.

#federal #hike #rates

WASHINGTON (AP) — Most Federal Reserve officials expect that another interest rate increase will likely be needed this year to combat inflation, according to minutes released Wednesday from the central bank's most recent meeting.
The officials unanimously agreed that inflation was still elevated and had not made much progress toward their 2% target in recent months, the minutes said. The Fed increased its key interest rate at the Sept. 15-16 meeting by a quarter-point to about 3.9%, its first increase in three years.
The increase defied President Donald Trump's repeated calls for the Fed to cut rates and prompted the president to criticize the Fed's rate-setting committee, though he still expressed support for Chairman Kevin Warsh, whom he appointed earlier this year. The rate increase comes as Americans are already struggling with high costs for groceries, gas and housing, and as affordability has taken on a leading role in the upcoming midterm elections, just seven weeks away.
Longer-term interest rates for mortgages and other borrowing have also jumped in the past few months for a range of reasons, including rising government debt, heavy borrowing by tech firms to finance data center construction, climbing oil and gas prices, and signs that growth and inflation remain elevated. The Fed's rate hike has likely played only a limited role in the increase.
Still, key policymakers have said since the meeting that the Fed can take some time to monitor the economy and the impact of last month's rate hike before making another move. Wall Street investors now forecast the Fed will keep its rate unchanged at its next meeting Oct. 28-29, according to futures pricing, and raise it when they meet in December.

#officials

A key gauge of where the market thinks rates are headed is the CME FedWatch survey, which polls interest rate traders. In the days leading up to the September Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting, almost 60% of those polled expected a 25-basis-point rate hike, which the FOMC delivered on Sept. 16.
While most, 78%, expect rates to stay the same at the Oct. 28 Fed meeting, an overwhelming majority of traders anticipate a rate hike when the FOMC meets on Dec. 9. Specifically, 67% expect a 25-basis-point increase, and 17% say rates will be 50 basis points higher by then.
Missed AI's "Act 1"? Act 2 Could Be 14x Bigger. Most investors think they missed the AI boat because they didn't buy Nvidia in 2005. But according to our **** ysts, we're only at the end of "Act 1"—the R&D phase. "Act 2" is the global rollout. Continue »
They may be taking cues from FOMC members themselves, like Fed Governor Michael Barr. In a speech on Sept. 29 in Detroit, Barr said eight words that gave a decent clue as to what he is thinking about rates.
"Further policy adjustments are likely to be needed," Barr said in Detroit last week, "to ensure inflation comes down to target in a timely fashion."

#missed

An XRP holder proposed raising XRP Ledger fees 100x, but even that hike would cost only $0.0015 per transaction, which amounts to a negligible dent across 63 billion circulating tokens.
David Schwartz called higher fees 'truly bizarre,' warning they would drive away payment processors and undermine XRP Ledger's core advantage of cheap, fast settlement.
Higher fees would force active users to subsidize passive holders, and any fee change requires validator approval, which is a threshold this proposal hasn't reached.
Building a portfolio and living off one are two completely different skills, and almost ***** ody teaches the second. This problem is what The Definitive Guide to Retirement Income helps, and it is free today. Read more here. (Sponsor)
Recently, an XRP (CRYPTO:XRP) holder made a bold proposal on X, suggesting that XRP Ledger fees be raised 10 to 100 times to enable a larger XRP burn with each transaction. Burning tokens reduces the total supply, a move many holders support because it could increase the value of their remaining tokens.

#tokens #ledger

Disney raised prices on many of its theme park offerings today, coinciding with the start of the company’s new fiscal year. But consumers aren’t pushing back the way they did a few years ago.
Disney’s price hikes are an annual October ritual for the company, and it’s always a tricky balancing act between increasing revenue and consumers’ willingness to pay.
Many ticket types, passes and add-ons at Disneyland are not increasing at all this time. But premium products are getting more expensive, like the highest-level, skip-the-line service at Walt Disney World, which could now run just shy of the $500 mark during peak demand.
It’s a reflection of the company’s strategy: Spread the price boosts across different audiences, while leaving bottom-tier prices - like the slowest season, one-day, one-park tickets - unchanged.
Its theme parks strategy, Disney said, has evolved over time. Higher-priced premium products and add-ons, alongside targeted discounts and a refresh of older attractions, allowed the company this summer to generate the strongest parks and cruises revenue in two years.

#disney #company #consumers

Benzinga and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue on some items through the links below.
The top 1% of Americans now control one-third of all U.S. net worth as inflation erodes purchasing power and the Federal Reserve's first rate hike since 2023 pushes borrowing costs higher.
The top 1% of U.S. households hold $60.3 trillion, a record 32.5% share of net worth, according to The Kobeissi Letter, citing Federal Reserve data.
Meanwhile, the bottom 50% hold $4.3 trillion, with the richest holding 14 times as much.
Don't Miss:

#federal #americans #reserve

Rising interest rates have the US on a collision course with the need to finally deal with its bloated debt pile, Goldman Sachs warns.
"Persistently higher rates would boost interest expense as a share of GDP — a key gauge of the cash outflows needed to service the debt — and push the debt-to-GDP ratio up to 132% by 2035, 10 percentage points above our baseline, raising the odds that deficit reduction becomes necessary sooner to stabilize the debt," Goldman Sachs strategist Pierfrancesco Mei wrote in a new note on Tuesday.
US Treasury yields have climbed aggressively this year, effectively pushing up the country's debt servicing costs. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield (^TNX) has surged more than 115 basis points, from around 4.10% late last year to a 24-year high of around 5.28% at present.
Read more: How soaring Treasury yields could hit your finances
This sustained sell-off across the bond market has been fueled by inflation brought on by the US war on Iran, which prompted the Federal Reserve to hike interest rates last month. The economy's resilience in the face of pricing pressures has also contributed to the sell-off.

#points #yields

Some offers on this page are from advertisers who pay us, which may affect which products we write about, but not our recommendations. See our Advertiser Disclosure.
According to average rates from the Zillow lender marketplace, fixed and adjustable mortgage rates are moving in different directions compared to Monday, following a shift in rate-hike expectations.
The current 30-year fixed rate today, Tuesday, October 6, 2026, was unchanged at 7.40%, the 15-year fixed rate increased 6 basis points to 6.72%, and the 5/1 ARM decreased 11 basis points to 7.29%.
Read more: Weekly survey of mortgage lenders with the lowest rates: Two lenders hit 8%
Here are the current mortgage rates today, Tuesday, October 6, 2026, according to the latest Zillow data:

#rate #year

Rising interest rates have the US on a collision course with finally having to deal with its bloated debt pile, warns Goldman Sachs.
"Persistently higher rates would boost interest expense as a share of GDP—a key gauge of the cash outflows needed to service the debt—and push the debt-to-GDP ratio up to 132% by 2035, 10 percentage points above our baseline, raising the odds that deficit reduction becomes necessary sooner to stabilize the debt," said Goldman Sachs strategist Pierfrancesco Mei in a new note on Tuesday.
US Treasury yields have climbed aggressively this year, effectively pushing up the country's debt servicing costs. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield has surged more than 115 basis points, from around 4.10% late last year to a 24-year high of around 5.28% at present.
This sustained sell-off across the bond market has been fueled by inflation brought on by the US war on Iran, which prompted the Federal Reserve to hike interest rates last month. The economy's resilience in the face of pricing pressures has also contributed to the sell-off.
What's happening in the bond market couldn't come at a worse time for US debt watchers.

#interest

Millie Bobby Brown and Jake Bongiovi explored Iceland with friends through whale watching, fishing, waterfall hikes and hot springs
Ice Spice joined the getaway and shared her own recap, calling the trip "Spiceland"
Brown and Bongiovi recently celebrated two years of marriage after welcoming their second child
Millie Bobby Brown and Jake Bongiovi are exploring the world together.
On Monday, Oct. 5, the Enola Holmes 3 star, 22, shared photos of a recent trip to Iceland with her husband, 24, as the pair joined friends for the European adventure.

#iceland #friends #trip

US actor Tom Cruise has surprised a British man who spent a year completing a series of extreme sporting challenges to raise money for charity.
Lloyd Kembrey, a facilities manager at the University of Bristol, took on the challenges to fundraise for children's hospice charity Jessie May.
His connection to the charity was born from his twin cousins, Francesca and Josephine, who were diagnosed with the life-limiting condition Sanfilippo disease type A when they were three-and-a-half years old. Both died in their teens.
Kembrey was inspired to undertake a number of exhilarating challenges in order to honour their memory and support other families facing similar circumstances.
The challenges he faced included a 31-mile ice skating ultramarathon in Finland, climbing the height of Mount Everest on a climbing wall and a 94-mile hike along southern England's Jurassic Coast.

#cruise

This summer, we took a family vacation to Oregon to hike in the Pacific Northwest. Not surprisingly, we saw a bunch of people decked out in clothing made by Columbia, the huge sportswear company founded in Portland in 1938, and named for the nearby river.
We also saw a lot of people wearing Patagonia clothes. Named after the vast geographic region at the southern tip of South America, shared by Argentina and Chile, Patagonia was founded by climber Yvon Chouinard in 1973 to provide durable climbing equipment and outdoor wear. The company heavily supports environmental causes and donates profits from the sale of their jackets, fleeces and other gear to ecological protection. The company even sued President Trump in 2017, for shrinking federal lands protections.
In addition to environmental causes, Patagonia has also championed the LGBTQ community by partnering with the Human Rights Campaign to oppose state legislation targeting their rights. This summer, though, the company sued one member of that community.
Wyn Wiley is an activist from Bend, Oregon, who focuses on environmental and LGBTQ+ issues, promoting acceptance of queer identities in the environmentalist and outdoors communities, and promoting awareness of climate change and its effects.
In October of 2018, Wiley created the character Pattie Gonia and produced short-form outdoors activism content on Instagram and TikTok, while dressing in drag. The first posted video garnered more than 100 million views. Pattie Gonia has 1.8 million Instagram followers and claims to have raised $3.7 million for environmental causes, including $1 million raised last year on a 100-mile hike. In 2022, Pattie Gonia partnered with The North Face, another outdoor gear juggernaut, for their 2022 "Summer of Pride" series, which consisted of outdoor community-building events focused on local LGBTQ+ engagement and acceptance.

#lgbtq #summer

Millions of Americans recently received unwelcome news about their cell phone bills.
In late June, T-Mobile (TMUS) said it was retiring over 1,000 older plans, shifting customers to newer offerings at an added cost of as much as $6 per line per month. And starting in August, AT&T (T) hiked rates on some of its older plans by $10 to $20 and increased a monthly per-line fee by $1.
The changes contributed to a steep 5.9% jump in Americans' wireless bills from July to August alone, according to Consumer Price Index data. It was the largest single-month jump since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking the category nearly three decades ago.
In a twist, last month's rising phone bills may have helped convince the Federal Reserve to implement its first interest rate hike in three years. The steep price jump likely contributed about 10 basis points of August's 0.3% month-over-month rise in core consumer prices, according to Wall Street ******* ysts. The hotter-than-expected jump in this category, which strips out price changes in the particularly volatile food and energy sectors, helped cement expectations for the Fed's 25 basis point hike to benchmark rates last Wednesday.
Read more: How the Fed rate decision affects your bank accounts, loans, credit cards, and investments

#august #plans

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (NASDAQ:HBAN) dropped 5.55% to $15.82 on September 16, 2026, close to its 52-week low. The price movement was triggered by a profit warning at a Barclays conference. Huntington brought down its 2027 EPS guidance from above $1.90 to the range of $1.75-$1.83, and its 2026 net interest income growth from 39%-43% to roughly 35%. What matters more than these numbers is the reason behind them. Deposit costs are rising, and loan pricing is tightening, and it landed on the day the Fed delivered its first interest rate hike since 2023. The drop therefore raises the question: is this an oversold bank or the opening crack in regional-bank margins?
A well-run bank has just lowered its guidance, citing intense competition for deposits and loans. If Huntington feels the margin pressure, then it is likely that its peers feel the same. This explains why Fifth Third shares slid 4.1% on the same afternoon alongside the whole financials group. The Fed's new hike makes the environment more unfavorable for the group in the near term. While rate increases eventually lift ***** et yields, banks must immediately offer higher deposit yields to retain balances, squeezing net interest margins in the near term. Furthermore, accelerated commercial real estate loan payoffs reduced total earning ***** ets, though these early payoffs lower credit risk on the loan book.
The selloff leans too much into the reset. A move to $1.75-$1.83 from above $1.90 is a modest single-digit trim. Huntington sustains its profit as well as its operational performance. Loans reached $189 billion from $50 billion in 2015. Deposits touched $222 billion. And one of the company's biggest growth engines, value-added fee income, compounded at a 14% annual rate since mid-2024, with year-to-date growth near 32%. The income helps offset a notable portion of the spread pressure and offers a competitive edge against pure spread lenders.
A higher-for-longer rate environment carries trade-offs for commercial banks. It drives up deposit expenses, reflecting the margin pressure Huntington reported. It also expands loan yields as credit ***** ets reprice. Deposit beta determines the net effect by measuring how much of each benchmark rate increase the bank transfers to depositors. After the rate hikes, deposit costs typically rise further, so betting on a near-term peak takes some faith. A lower beta allows fee revenue to support earnings, whereas a higher beta keeps the squeeze sustained over multiple quarters.

#bank #interest #Growth

Millions of Americans recently received unwelcome news about their cell phone bills.
In late June, T-Mobile (TMUS) said it was retiring over 1,000 older plans, shifting customers to newer offerings at an added cost of as much as $6 per line per month. And starting in August, AT&T (T) hiked rates on some of its older plans by $10 to $20 and increased a monthly per-line fee by $1.
The changes contributed to a steep 5.9% jump in Americans' wireless bills from July to August alone, according to Consumer Price Index data. It was the largest single-month jump since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking the category nearly three decades ago.
In a twist, last month's rising phone bills may have helped convince the Federal Reserve to implement its first interest rate hike in three years. The steep price jump likely contributed about 10 basis points of August's 0.3% month-over-month rise in core consumer prices, according to Wall Street ******* ysts. The hotter-than-expected jump in this category, which strips out price changes in the particularly volatile food and energy sectors, helped cement expectations for the Fed's 25 basis point hike to benchmark rates last Wednesday.
Read more: How the Fed rate decision affects your bank accounts, loans, credit cards, and investments

#Consumer

In the end, Kevin Warsh's Federal Reserve acquitted itself well. For all the uncertainty he had sparked at the previous meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, when he refused to provide any indication of what he was prepared to do to tame stubborn inflation, the chair on Wednesday presided over a unanimous decision to raise interest rates for the first time in three years.
"Today's action starts to show that we're serious about this," he said at the press conference after the meeting, with "this" meaning inflation in excess of the Fed's 2% target for over five years. Welcome though it was, his embrace of economic orthodoxy nonetheless did little to dispel the Keystone Cops quality of governance in Donald Trump's US.
Warsh's resolve – raising rates just a few weeks before elections that will determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress – appeared even more resolute in the face of a veiled threat from White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett, who pointed out to his chums on Fox that "if you want an independent Fed, then one thing the Fed does is it stays out of the way of elections".
The central bankers' parsimonious comments in the press conference following the meeting made a sharp contrast with the more unhinged commentary from other members of the administration, including the president himself, who earlier this month celebrated the resilience of the labor market with a mind-boggling threat to "STOP TRADING WITH COUNTRIES WITH WHICH WE HAVE A DEFICIT" unless the Fed cut interest rates.
Trump has yet to turn on Warsh in the way he did on his predecessor, Jerome "numbskull" Powell. But the signs are ominous. After the rate hike, Trump went ballistic – spewing more of the random, incoherent thoughts that have become his trademark. "Interest Rates in the United States should be 1%, or less, because we are the Best Credit in the World," he wrote on social media, despite recalcitrant inflation and a budget deficit that is likely to exceed $2tn this year. He again demanded the powers that be to "LOWER THE INTEREST RATES FOR THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, AND FAST!"

#rates #federal #states

Affirm Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:AFRM) has underperformed the broader market year to date, but the tide is slowly turning. Robust growth in interest-bearing loans, a strategic partnership with Shopify in Australia, and accelerating volumes at Amazon provide multiple avenues for continued growth.
On September 12, Goldman Sachs raised its price target to $115 from $106, citing improving underlying fundamentals. The hike follows the company's impressive fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 results, with revenues surging 33% to $1.2 billion and operating income rising $89 million to $147 million.
The robust revenue growth came as the company continued to attract more business interest-bearing loans. Interest income rose 35% in the fourth quarter, in line with a 33% increase in average net loans held for investment partners. More importantly, 80% of Affirm's direct-to-consumer product loans carried interest at quarter-end, giving the company an increasingly meaningful source of recurring interest income.
The investment bank has also touted the growth opportunity around Affirm Card, which is helping the company expand its relationship with consumers beyond individual BNPL transactions. Active cardholders more than doubled to 5.2 million, resulting in a 124% increase in Card GMV to $2.8 billion.
Management has already hinted at continued upside momentum by estimating a massive increase in GMV to $64 billion in fiscal 2027 and an adjusted operating margin of 30.5%. Against this backdrop, Wolfe Research ****** yst Darrin Peller upgraded the stock to Outperform with a $90 price target. According to the ****** yst, Affirm Holdings is a winner in the point-of-sale financing ****** e.

#interest #billion #company

The price of Bitcoin (CRYPTO: $BTC) and other cryptocurrencies strengthened heading into the weekend after a volatile week dominated by an interest rate hike from the U.S. Federal Reserve
On the afternoon of Sept. 18, Bitcoin was up 6% and trading at $80,850 U.S. The largest cryptocurrency had been trading near $75,000 U.S. on the eve of the U.S. interest rate decision on Sept. 16. Other digital ****** ets were gaining strength at week's end, with Ethereum (CRYPTO: $ETH) also up 6% and Solana's (CRYPTO: $SOL) price rising 11%.
It's proving to be a quick recovery for digital ****** ets after the U.S. central bank raised its trendsetting Fed Funds Rate by 25 basis points, its first hike in three years. Crypto appears to be staging a relief rally as the market welcomes slightly higher interest rates that are used to dampen inflation.
More From Cryptoprowl:
U.S. Regulators Push Crypto Rules As Clarity Act Stalls

#sept #digital

Six-Month Run: NVDA stock has climbed 20.6% since mid-March, a 45.4% annualized pace, even as the S&P 500 wobbled under the Fed's rate hike and a 10-year Treasury yield near 5%.
Model Verdict: TIKR's model puts fair value at $643, implying 193% total return by early 2031.
Coverage Split: Nvidia stock carries 48 buy ratings, 10 outperforms, 2 holds, 2 no opinions and 1 sell, with a mean target of $328, 50% above the current price.
Supply Squeeze: Nvidia guided to roughly 70% revenue growth for fiscal 2028 on demand it calls supply-constrained, with cloud industry backlog above $2 trillion.
Nvidia (NVDA) stock has climbed 20.6% since mid-March, a 45.4% annualized pace, while the Federal Reserve's first rate hike in more than three years pushed the 10-year Treasury yield toward 5% and dragged the S&P 500 into back-to-back weekly declines. Most of the market treated the hike as a reason to sell. Nvidia stock kept climbing anyway.

#march #model #supply #since

The first full week of trading in September didn't give Zscaler (NASDAQ: ZS) investors much to celebrate. During the shortened trading week that followed Labor Day, Zscaler dropped about 3%. This week, however, is a very different story, thanks to a firm providing an auspicious outlook for the cybersecurity stock.
According to data provided by S&P Global Market Intelligence, Zscaler shares were up 20.7% from the end of trading last Friday through 3:37 p.m. today.
Missed AI's "Act 1"? Act 2 Could Be 15x Bigger. Most investors think they missed the AI boat because they didn't buy Nvidia in 2005. But according to our ******* ysts, we're only at the end of "Act 1"—the R&D phase. "Act 2" is the global rollout. Continue »
Maintaining its outperform rating, Bernstein hiked its price target on Zscaler stock to $298 from $224 on Thursday morning. Based on Zscaler's closing price of $191.58 on Wednesday, the Bernstein price target implies 56% upside.
According to Thefly.com, Bernstein based its improved outlook on the belief that there's growing positive market sentiment toward cybersecurity stocks. In addition, Bernstein notes that cybersecurity stocks it had previously identified as "too cheap" are now reasonable valued, yet Zscaler is one option that still provides material upside.

#week

US stocks were mixed on Friday as investors continued to calibrate to the Federal Reserve's first rate hike in three years and existential fears about artificial intelligence's capabilities.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) rose 0.4% but ended the week in green. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 (^GSPC) rose 0.2% but eked out a loss for the week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) was down 0.2% and lost more than 1.5% for the week.
The 10-year Treasury yield (^TNX) rose 5 basis points to hover near the 5% level as traders increased bets that the Fed will raise rates again in October.
Markets appeared to look past the Fed's 25 basis point rate hike this week, which was widely expected. US stock continued to climb after the Bank of ***** an raised interest rates to the highest level in 31 years.
However, ***** ysts and top CEOs aren't convinced that one rate hike (by the Fed) will be enough to bring down stubbornly high inflation. "It's not clear to me we've slayed inflation," JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon told Yahoo Finance this week.

#week #years #down #level

XRP shook off a sharp regulatory setback this week, climbing more than 7% over 24 hours to trade near $1.39 after briefly touching lows around $1.27.
The rebound followed a rocky 48 hours that combined a failed Senate vote with the Federal Reserve's first rate hike since 2023.
Cloture is the Senate procedure required to end debate and move a bill toward a final vote, needing 60 senators to succeed. On September 15, the CLARITY Act fell short in a narrow 50-49 tally, missing that threshold and stalling a proposed federal framework for digital **** ets.
XRP dropped more than 8% in the immediate aftermath, touching lows near $1.27 to $1.28. Pressure intensified the next day when the Fed raised its benchmark rate by 25 basis points to a range of 3.75% to 4.00%, a move that typically weighs on risk **** ets broadly.
The sell-off, however, proved short-lived. XRP has since rebounded to $1.39, up 7.23% over 24 hours, even as the token slipped slightly by 0.30% in the past hour. Trading volume held near $3.9 billion, close to its 30-day average, suggesting genuine buying rather than thin, low-liquidity trading.

#near #senate #since

The dollar index (DXY00) fell from a 7-week high on Friday and finished down by -0.03%. The dollar gave its advance on Friday on weaker-than-expected US economic news that showed Aug manufacturing production and Aug leading indicators unexpectedly declined. Also, Friday's -1% fall in WTI crude oil eased inflation expectations and could persuade the Fed to loosen monetary policy, a bearish factor for the dollar.
The dollar initially moved higher on Friday on weakness in the yen, which fell to a 2-week low today. Higher T-note yields on Friday also supported the dollar. The dollar also has carryover support from Wednesday when the FOMC raised interest rates by 25 bp and signaled another rate hike by the end of the year. The dollar fell from its best level after US
Dollar Gains on Yen Weakness and Higher T-note Yields
Wall Street's Favorite Safe Haven Could Be In Trouble. How Investors Should Play Gold Here.
Stop Missing Market Moves: Get the FREE Barchart Brief – your midday dose of stock movers, trending sectors, and actionable trade ideas, delivered right to your inbox. Sign Up Now!

#Friday #yields

Kansas City Federal Reserve president Jeff Schmid said Friday that he supported the central bank's decision to raise interest rates this week and suggested that more rate hikes could be warranted, a view that was echoed by the rest of the central bank and Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh.
"The Fed has work to do on inflation, and this week's action was a step in that direction," Schmid said in a speech in Vail, Colo.
Read more: How the Fed rate decision affects your bank accounts, loans, credit cards, and investments
The Federal Open Market Committee voted on Wednesday in a unanimous decision to raise its benchmark interest rate to the range of 3.75% to 4% from 3.5% to 3.75%, the first rate hike since July 2023
Schmid noted that inflation has run above the central bank's 2% target for over five years, and the most recent price readings suggest a pace trending above 3%. Inflation has jumped this year as oil and overall energy prices have leapt higher amid the conflict with Iran. Even when stripping out energy and food prices, so-called "core" inflation has also been sticky.

#interest

Happy Friday, traders. Welcome to our weekly market wrap, where we take a look back at these last five trading days with a focus on the market news, economic data, and headlines that had the most impact on gold prices and other key correlated ****** ets—and may continue to in the future.
So, what kind of week has it been?
Gold took a more volatile path than expected but rebounded from a post-FOMC low near $4,260/oz to trade just above $4,350/oz shortly after the US market open on Friday, putting the yellow metal in position for a moderate weekly gain.
The Federal Reserve delivered the week's main event on Wednesday, unanimously raising policy rates by 25 basis points. Gold's sharp initial drop appeared tied less to the hike itself than to projections showing elevated inflation expectations and another 25-basis-point increase before the end of 2026.
Thursday brought the countermove as crude oil slid back toward and then below $100 per barrel, US Treasury yields eased, and gold recovered to around $4,360/oz. The Bank of ****** an's overnight rate hike to 1.25% added another tailwind into Friday.

#Friday #weekly #welcome

The Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the first time since July 2023 on Wednesday, and the S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) immediately dropped. It rose again before the day was over, but it's been steadily declining over the past month since hitting a high in mid-August.
There are a number of reasons for the fall, and part of that has been the anticipation of rate hikes. The Fed's decision has a lot to do with the other reasons, including high inflation and rising oil prices, and none of these spell enthusiasm for the market. Here's how the inflation outlook and accompanying interest rates signal a warning for investors.
Missed AI's "Act 1"? Act 2 Could Be 15x Bigger. Most investors think they missed the AI boat because they didn't buy Nvidia in 2005. But according to our **** ysts, we're only at the end of "Act 1"—the R&D phase. "Act 2" is the global rollout. Continue »
The simple version is that rising oil prices increase production costs, leading to higher consumer prices. The artificial intelligence (AI) buildout is contributing as well; memory prices are skyrocketing as hyperscalers have an insatiable demand for scarce memory products, and Apple, for example, said it's going to raise some prices.
As inflation surges and prices go up, it's harder for shoppers to keep spending. The worry is that lower consumer spending will lead to sagging sales for many companies, and the market is pricing that in as the inflation outlook persists.

#inflation #since #high #market

The big day that seemingly everyone had circled on their calendar for weeks, Sept. 16, lived up to the hype.
On Wednesday, Sept. 16, Fed Chair Kevin Warsh and the 11 other voting members of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) raised the federal funds target rate by 25 basis points to a new range of 3.75%-4.00%. The first interest rate hike since July 2023 wasn't well-received by Wall Street, with the time-tested Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES:^DJI) tumbling more than 1%, and the broad-based S&P 500 (SNPINDEX:^GSPC) and innovation-powered Nasdaq Composite (NASDAQINDEX:^IXIC) edging lower.
Missed Nvidia in 2009? This Rare Signal Is Flashing Again. In 2009, a "Double Down" signal flashed for a little-known chipmaker called Nvidia. For the first time in years, that same "Total Conviction" signal is flashing for a company 1/100th the size of Nvidia. Continue »
While Warsh's and the FOMC's actions are bound to raise questions and incite worry on Wall Street, nearly 36 years of history make clear what comes next for stocks.
Fed Chair Kevin Warsh and the FOMC just kicked off the first rate-hiking cycle in three years. Image source: Official Federal Reserve Photo.

#years #sept #chair

Millions of Americans recently received unwelcome news about their cell phone bills.
In late June, T-Mobile (TMUS) said it was retiring over 1,000 older plans, shifting customers to newer offerings at an added cost of as much as $6 per line per month. And starting in August, AT&T (T) hiked rates on some of its older plans by $10 to $20 and increased a monthly per-line fee by $1.
The changes contributed to a steep 5.9% jump in Americans' wireless bills from July to August alone, according to Consumer Price Index data. It was the largest single-month jump since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking the category nearly three decades ago.
In a twist, last month's rising phone bills may have helped convince the Federal Reserve to implement its first interest rate hike in three years. The steep price jump likely contributed about 10 basis points of August's 0.3% month-over-month rise in core consumer prices, according to Wall Street ***** ysts. The hotter-than-expected jump in this category, which strips out price changes in the particularly volatile food and energy sectors, helped cement expectations for the Fed's 25 basis point hike to benchmark rates last Wednesday.
Read more: How the Fed rate decision affects your bank accounts, loans, credit cards, and investments

#month #americans #august #older

The Magnificent 7 stocks are having a tough ride in 2026, and only Apple (AAPL) is outperforming the Nasdaq 100 Index ($IUXX). Digging deeper, Nvidia (NVDA) is the only other constituent that is up in double digits. Despite its recent rally, Tesla (TSLA) is still down over 18% year-to-date (YTD) and is the worst-performing Mag 7 stock.
The price action is not difficult to explain. Investors are now getting increasingly wary of tech companies' ever-rising capex to build artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure. Apple was an outlier in the AI buildout race and is now sitting pretty as investors realize that waiting it out wasn't exactly a bad move on the iPhone maker's part.
Mark Cuban Says He Was Dizzy for Months, So He Built a VR Fix That Does at Home 'Much Of What A 180k Machine' Does
Bank of America Just Declared a 'Generational Entry Point' in U.S. Bonds. Why Investors Should Be Backing Up the Truck on Treasuries Here.
Nvidia, OpenAI, and Oracle's $745B Financing Circle Just Hit Its First Stress Test: A Fed Rate Hike

#aapl #iuxx

Robinhood chief executive Vlad Tenev told investors that the company's prediction markets business is at the beginning of something much larger, and he put a number on it that most executives avoid saying out loud. "I think we're just at the beginning of a Prediction Markets supercycle that could drive trillions in annual volume over time," he said on Robinhood Markets' (HOOD) fourth quarter and full year 2025 earnings call on February 10.
He reported adoption below the forecast. In the same remarks, Tenev said prediction market volumes had "more than doubled yet again" in the fourth quarter, "with over 12 billion contracts traded in 2025, which is the first full year of Prediction Markets." Customers had traded more than four billion further contracts in the opening weeks of 2026. He called it "the fastest-growing business in our history, $300 million-plus run rate in its first year."
Mark Cuban Says He Was Dizzy for Months, So He Built a VR Fix That Does at Home 'Much Of What A 180k Machine' Does
Bank of America Just Declared a 'Generational Entry Point' in U.S. Bonds. Why Investors Should Be Backing Up the Truck on Treasuries Here.
Nvidia, OpenAI, and Oracle's $745B Financing Circle Just Hit Its First Stress Test: A Fed Rate Hike

#prediction #year #tenev