After a month of discussion about the next move by the Fed’s Federal Open Markets Committee (FOMC), decision day comes this week. The FOMC starts to meet on Tuesday and around 2:00 PM on Wednesday the Fed will announce the rate move. A 75pbs increase is widely anticipated.

In my view, as Fed Chair Jay Powell has done a good job of telegraphing policy and avoided surprising markets, I don’t expect anything different at this meeting. Markets are clearly anticipating a 75bps move and any other outcome would surely shock markets. Central bankers from around the world are in regular contact with each other; hence I don’t believe the European Central Bank acted in a vacuum when they increased EU rates by 75bps last week. Any other outcome by the US would likely cause global concern about the lack of coordination among central bankers, an outcome Powell and the Fed surely want to avoid.

While there may be little suspense about the rate move to be announced on Wednesday, there is always a great deal of interest in the Chair’s post-decision press conference. This week’s presser by Chair Powell is happening just six days before the US goes to vote in the midterms. This will put a great deal of pressure on the Chair to walk a fine line between being too pessimistic about in...

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