The U.S. Central Bank’s decision to implement the steepest rise in interest rates for nearly 30 years will have a ripple effect across the world.
In its bid to combat soaring inflation the Federal Reserve’s move is likely to roil the U.S. mortgage industry making an already highly stressful process even more difficult for would-be homeowners.
As the nation’s authority on monetary policies, the Fed plays a critical role in managing recessions.
The Fed is currently attempting to avoid a recession by engineering what’s known as a “soft landing,” in which incremental interest rate hikes are used to curb inflation without pushing the economy into recession.
But a successful soft landing is extremely rare as the monetary policy needed to slow down the economy is often enforced too late to make any meaningful impact.