The Economic Update – October 2013
The highly anticipated ‘SepTaper’ proved to be NO taper as the US Federal Reserve (the Fed) decided not to reduce the size of its monthly asset purchases.
In outlining the decision, Chairman Ben Bernanke noted that the Fed was concerned over the impact of the potential US government shutdown along with the recent tightening in financial conditions on growth.
To emphasise this, Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) members revised down their forecasts for growth in 2014 as a range of housing indicators showed signs of weakening in response to …