Federal Reserve Raises Fed Funds Target Range to 3-3.25%

By Tom Burnett CFA On September 21, 2022, the Federal Reserve voted to raise the Fed Funds target rate by 75 basis points. The new range is now 3 to 3.25%. The vote was unanimous. The Fed statement made it clear that the Board will continue to move rates higher until inflation comes back down...

By Tom Burnett CFA On September 14, 2022, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Producer Price Index data for August. The PPI fell 0.1% in August, following a decrease of 0.4% in July and an increase of 1.0% in June (data from BLS press release.) In August, there was a 1.2% decline in the...

By Tom Burnett CFA On September 13, 2022, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released consumer price information for the month of August. The CPI rose 0.1% in August after being unchanged in July (all data taken from the BLS press release). Over the past 12 months, the Index rose 8.3%, down from 8.5% in…

By Tom Burnett CFA On September 2, 2022, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the August employment report. Total jobs grew by 315,000 to a new record high of 152.7 million, 240,000 higher than the previous record set in February 2020. Over the past 12 months, total nonfarm employment has risen by…

By Tom Burnett CFA Investors are experiencing a difficult year in 2022 with both the equity and fixed- income markets providing negative returns through August 23, 2022 (all data taken from WSJ.com). The stock markets have been weak in 2022 as exemplified by the -13.2% return for the S/P 500 Index. The…