What does the FED's rate cut mean for 2025?

The move, the Fed's third rate cut of the year, reduces the central bank’s target rate to between 4.25% and 4.5%. In its statement announcing the cut, the Fed now projects just two interest rate cuts for 2025. It said the unemployment rate remains low, while the rate of inflation "remains somewhat elevated."

Are future rate cuts guaranteed?

Powell’s response is, in effect, that future rate cuts aren’t guaranteed. For those who might not follow Fed policy that closely, when Powell talks about how inflation has come down, that doesn’t mean that prices have broadly declined, or that they will going forward.

Do policymakers want to cut rates so much?

Policymakers do not want to cut rates so much that they reignite the economy, though — and they have now arrived at a point where it is uncertain how much further rates should fall. “Our policy stance is now significantly less restrictive,” Jerome H. Powell, the Fed chair, said during a news conference on Wednesday.