October 5, 1999 FOMC Statement

FOMC statement

FOMC statement

For immediate release

The Federal Open Market Committee decided today to leave its target for the federal funds rate unchanged.

Strengthening productivity growth has been fostering favorable trends in unit costs and prices, and much recent information suggests that these trends have been sustained.

Nonetheless, the growth of demand has continued to outpace that of supply, as evidenced by a decreasing pool of available workers willing to take jobs. In these circumstances, the Federal Open Market Committee will need to be especially alert in the months ahead to the potential for costs to increase significantly in excess of productivity in a manner that could contribute to inflation pressures and undermine the impressive performance of the economy.

Against this background, the Committee adopted a directive that was biased toward a possible firming of policy going forward. Committee members emphasized that such a directive did not signify a commitment to near-term action. The Committee will need to evaluate additional information on the balance of aggregate supply and demand and conditions in financial markets.

The Federal Open Market Committee today voted to raise its target for the federal funds rate by 25 basis points to 5-1/4 percent. In a related action, the Board of Governors approved a 25 basis point increase in the discount rate to 4-3/4 percent.

With financial markets functioning more normally, and with persistent strength in domestic demand, foreign economies firming and labor markets remaining very tight, the degree of monetary ease required to address the global financial market turmoil of last fall is no longer consistent with sustained, noninflationary, economic expansion.

Today's increase in the federal funds rate, together with the policy action in June and the firming of conditions more generally in U.S. financial markets over recent months, should markedly diminish the risk of rising inflation going forward. As a consequence, the directive the Federal Open Market Committee adopted is symmetrical with regard to the outlook for policy over the near term.

In taking the discount rate action, the Federal Reserve Board approved requests submitted by the Boards of Directors of the Federal Reserve Banks of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Richmond, Atlanta, Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City, and San Francisco. The discount rate is the interest rate that is charged depository institutions when they borrow from their district Federal Reserve Banks.

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