Why the Fed needs to boost risk tolerance

The drop in stock prices last month had some people wondering whether it was time for Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve to call a halt to raising interest rates.

The drop in stock prices last month had some people wondering whether it was time for Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve to call a halt to raising interest rates.

That might come as a shock to many other market observers. The federal funds rate is at just 2.75%; at the start of the year some predictions had it that it would go as high as 4.5% by the end of 2005. And for now the Fed is maintaining its stance of measured increases, which is its way of telling market participants that they should expect quarter-point increases at each successive open market committee meeting.

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