The average rate for a conforming 30-year fixed-rate mortgage jumped from 4.12 to 4.23 percent over the past week, the highest rate since the beginning of May and the biggest one-week increase since the beginning of the year. Speculation that the Federal Reserve might start raising rates sooner than expected... Read More »

With indications of a rebound in economic activity in the second quarter and “sufficient underlying strength” to support ongoing improvement in the labor market, Federal Reserve officials have raised the possibility of removing stimulus “sooner than…currently anticipated” but have no immediate plans to ease their current “accommodative” stance and... Read More »

Citing a rebound in economic activity while noting the housing sector remains slow (despite historically low interest rates and rising inventories), the Fed has announced another cut to its bond purchase program which was designed to keep longer-term interest rates low.  With the cut, the Fed is on track... Read More »

While mortgage credit conditions in the U.S. remain “generally tight,” and applications for purchase mortgages remain “tepid,” according to the Fed, signs of easing continue to emerge, including indications of “a net easing of banks’ credit standards for home-purchase loans to prime customers in the first quarter.” The Fed’s... Read More »

While the U.S. economy grew by an anemic 0.1 percent in the first quarter of 2014, “information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in March indicates that growth in economic activity has picked up recently.” As such, the Fed is cutting its monthly stimulus spending by another... Read More »

As we noted last month, the minutes from the Federal Open Market Committee’s October meeting suggested that the Fed was “likely to trim their monthly purchase of $85 billion in bonds “in coming months,” perhaps even “before an unambiguous further improvement in the outlook apparent.” This... Read More »

“Stocks soared Friday, propelling the Dow Jones industrials up more than 180 points, after the Federal Reserve, acknowledging that the stock market’s plunge posed a threat to the economy, slashed its discount rate by a half percentage point.” “The Fed cut the discount rate to 5.75 percent from 6.25... Read More »