Thursday: Unemployment Claims, Philly Fed Mfg Survey

From Jon Hilsenrath at the WSJ: Fed Keeps Rates Unchanged, Sees Eventual Rise in 2015, 2016

The Fed also said it would reduce monthly purchases of mortgage and Treasury bonds by another $10 billion next month to $35 billion.  ....With the job market gradually improving, the Fed is taking away that support and slowly turning its attention to the timing and pace of short-term interest rate increases. It has kept short-term rates near zero since December 2008 and isn't planning to start raising them until next year.

From Robin Harding at the Financial Times: Fed sets the stage for lower volatility this summer

The most revealing bit of Fed analysis at the June meeting was the change that did not take place: there was almost no movement in the Fed’s expectations for inflation. Indeed, its forecasts for 2014, 2015 and 2016 were almost entirely unchanged – with inflation below target in every year.

That was something of a surprise given that the consumer price index – admittedly not the Fed’s preferred measure – is up by more than 2 per cent on a year ago. “The CPI index has been a bit on the high side,” said chairwoman Ms Yellen, “but I think the data that we’re seeing is noisy.”
excerpt with permission

From Goldman Sachs: FOMC Stays the Course

Today's FOMC meeting was a touch more dovish than we expected. ... Chair Yellen downplayed the recent firmer inflation data and signaled some willingness to let inflation overshoot the 2% target if the employment side of the mandate continues to disappoint.

Our forecast for the first hike in the funds rate remains early 2016, about six months later than the FOMC's own projections and the market consensus. ...

The risks relative to our forecast are, however, tilted towards an earlier hike. One reason is that recent inflation news has been firmer than expected. Another is that financial conditions no longer appear tighter than "appropriate."

Thursday:
• At 8:30 AM ET, the initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The consensus is for claims to decrease to 313 thousand from 317 thousand.

• At 10:00 AM, the Philly Fed manufacturing survey for June. The consensus is for a reading of 13.0, down from 15.0 last month (above zero indicates expansion).