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What's going on, guys? It is Thursday, February 1st, and today we are talking about FOMC Day.

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Hello, friends. Back with a macro check-in day. And the long and short of it was that the first

FOMC meeting of the year was marked by uncertainty and a lack of confidence. So the Federal

Reserve held policy rates steady on Wednesday, no surprise there,

with Jerome Powell explaining that he wants to see more convincing evidence of low inflation

before starting rate cuts. The last six months of data have shown short-term inflation at the

2% level accompanied by strong growth. Markets have been pricing in a rate cut cycle to begin in

March, with as many as seven rate

cuts this year.

But the current amount of data just wasn't enough for the Fed to feel confident that

inflation is over.

Powell explained that decreasing inflation without declines in growth or the labor market

gives the Fed the luxury of looking at more data before making the call to start cutting

rates.

He said, it is a highly consequential decision to start the process of dialing back restriction,

and we want to get that right. We feel like the strong economy, strong labor market,

and inflation coming down gives us the ability to do that. Now, the focus was clearly on the

...