“Most of the participants anticipated that the economy would continue to advance towards those objectives” and that the level “could be reached this year,” according to the minutes of the July 27 and 28 meeting, which were released on Wednesday.
Amid disagreement over how long the Fed should wait to start cutting its monthly $ 120 billion bond purchases, “several participants” said that monetary policy was still necessary to fix the damage to the labor market caused by the pandemic.
“A few” said that Fed policy had little to contribute, and “several” said that the condition of labor markets before the pandemic “may not be the correct benchmark”, given long-lasting changes in policy. economy.
At the end of that meeting, Fed officials said they continued to have faith in the United States’ economic recovery, despite the Delta variant of the coronavirus fueling a worrying increase in cases, and continued to draw up plans for the eventual end of the Monthly purchases of Treasuries and Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBS).
Analysts expect the Fed to announce its plan to cut its asset purchases at the monetary policy meeting on September 21-22, but are less certain about how quickly the actual cut to the purchase program will take place. bond.
Fed Chairman Jerome Powell could also provide information in his remarks at the central bank’s annual conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, next week.