The US Federal Reserve System acting as the national central bank has raised the base interest rate by 25 percentage points to 0.5-0.75%, the regulator said in a statement on Wednesday after the meeting of its management.
This is the first time the US Federal Reserve System raised the rate this year.
In December 2015, the US regulator increased the base interest rate by 0.25 percentage points to 0.25-0.5%. Before that, the base interest rate was increased only in June 2006 and since December 2008 and until December 2015 it remained almost at a zero level ― in the range of 0-0.25%.
Financial market expected the Fed to increase the rate on the results of today’s meeting. In particular, Bloomberg poll revealed that only 5 of the 64 economists surveyed expected the Fed to maintain the interest rate at the range of 0.25-0.5%. The rest of the surveyed experts predicted a rate hike by 25 percentage points to 0.5-0.75%.