Do repost and rate:
The Federal Reserve said Thursday said it would hold U.S. interest rates at their current level, close to zero, and added qualitative criteria to govern how long it will keep up its $120-a-month bond-buying program.
“Economic activity and employment have continued to recover but remain well below their levels at the beginning of the year,” according to a statement released by the central bank’s monetary-policy committee following this week’s two-day, closed-door meeting
- Key target rate for federal funds to stay in a range of 0% to 0.25%
- Fed plans to keep buying $80 billion of U.S. Treasury bonds and $40 billion of agency mortgage-backed securities every month "until substantial further progress has been made toward the committee's maximum employment and price stability goals."
- That's a change in wording from the statement issued after the Fed's previous meeting in November, where it said the bond purchases would continue "to sustain smooth market functioning and help foster accommodative financial conditions."
Traders in digital-asset markets have tracked the Fed’s decisions this year because many analysts say the U.S. central bank’s trillions of dollars of money-printing could bolster the cryptocurrency’s use among institutional investors as an an inflation hedge.
