Interest Rates Likely to Rise

(Reuters) - Federal Reserve policymakers are largely united on the need to raise borrowing costs further, minutes from their most recent policy meeting show, despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s view that interest rate hikes have already gone too far. 

Every Fed policymaker backed the central bank’s September decision to raise the target policy rate to between 2 percent and 2.25 percent, according to minutes of the Sept. 25-26 meeting, published Wednesday. 

Participants in the Fed’s rate-setting committee also “generally anticipated that further gradual increases” in short-term borrowing costs “would most likely be consistent” with the kind of continued economic expansion, labor market strength, and firm inflation that most of them are anticipating, the minutes showed. 

“This gradual approach would balance the risk of tightening monetary policy too quickly, which could lead to an abrupt slowing in the economy and inflation moving below the Committee’s objective, against the risk of moving too slowly, which could engender inflation persistently above the objective and possibly contribute to a buildup of financial imbalances,” the minutes said. 

U.S. stocks closed slightly lower and U.S. Treasury yields gained a bit as traders continued to bet on further rate hikes ahead. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield ticked up 3 basis points to 3.184 percent. The dollar also rose.