The U.S. Federal Reserve delivered an emergency half-percentage point interest rate cut Tuesday in a bid to protect the longest-ever economic expansion from the spreading coronavirus.
“The coronavirus poses evolving risks to economic activity,” the Fed said in a statement. “In light of these risks and in support of achieving its maximum employment and price stability goals, the Federal Open Market Committee decided today to lower the target range for the federal funds rate by 1/2 percentage point.”
U.S. stocks briefly reversed earlier declines before resuming their selloff, while the 10-year Treasury yield touched 1.09%. Fed funds futures are pricing more than a percentage point of central bank rate reductions for 2020, including another quarter-point cut in the first half of the year.
The central bank also said it is “closely monitoring developments and their implications for the economic outlook and will use its tools and act as appropriate to support the economy.”
The Fed’s action could presage a wave of easing from other central banks around the world. It came hours after Chairman Jerome Powell and finance chiefs from the Group of Seven nations said they would “use all appropriate policy tools to achieve strong, sustainable growth and safeguard against downside risks.” That echoed a statement Powell made on Friday.
The vote for the emergency cut to a range of 1% to 1.25% was unanimous. The Fed also said in the statement that the “fundamentals of the U.S. economy remain strong.”
Powell will hold a press conference Tuesday at 11 a.m. in Washington, the Fed said.
U.S. central bankers were scheduled to gather March 17-18 in Washington. Tuesday’s decision was the first inter-meeting cut since the financial crisis of October 2008.
The reduction marks a stark shift for Powell and his colleagues. They had previously projected no change in rates during 2020, remaining on the sidelines during a U.S. election year, after lowering their benchmark three times in 2019 to a range of 1.5% to 1.75%.
Clarida Stance
As recently as last week, some officials, including Vice Chairman Richard Clarida, had indicated they thought it was too soon to respond to the virus. They pledged to monitor the situation, but argued monetary policy was already easy and the fundamentals of the economy strong with unemployment near a 50-year low.
But as the number of reported cases of the virus rose around the world in recent days and the U.S. reported its first fatality, traders increasingly bet the Fed would step in to shore up confidence and keep credit flowing. Powell seemed to cement that view with his emergency statement on Friday, which lent some support to stocks.
Powell has staked his chairmanship on sustaining the expansion, words he has used to describe the essential mission of the FOMC, the Fed’s rate-setting panel. Despite the limited ability of monetary policy to ease the impact of a public health emergency, the rate cut could help sustain consumer and business sentiment. Lawmakers are working on a $7.5 billion virus response bill, another reminder that critical fiscal policy can take weeks to move through Congress.
Lower rates do little for factories lacking needed materials from abroad and are unlikely to spur consumers to shop if they’re scared of infection. But they do ease financial conditions by making debt payments easier to manage and by calming volatility.
Wall Street banks expect more to come from the Fed. Those at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said on Sunday that the Fed would end up cutting its benchmark by a total of 100 basis points in the first half of this year as the world economy contracts.
