Looking past surprisingly grim growth in the first three months of the year, the Federal Reserve on Wednesday decided to keep moving slowly toward the exit of its bond-buying stimulus plan.
As expected, the U.S. central bank trimmed the size of its bond-buying strategy by $10 billion to $45 billion. This is the fourth straight meeting with an identical, gradual, reduction.
The decision was announced hours after a report showed the economy barely grew in the first three months of the year. The Commerce Department said the economy expanded at a 0.1% rate in January, February and March, an abrupt deceleration from 2.6% growth in the last quarter of 2013.
In a statement, the Fed said data shows “that growth in economic activity has picked up recently.”
The central bank also said the labor market “showed further improvement” and consumer spending “appears to be rising more quickly.”
At its meeting, the Fed decided once again to hold its benchmark federal funds rate at zero, where it has been since December 2008.
Source: Marketwatch
