Broader indicators

The Fed lowered its overnight interest rate to 0% in December 2008 as part of the steps it took to trigger growth in the economy amid the global financial crisis. That crisis hurt the US economic growth and resulted in high levels of unemployment.

Along with lowering the interest rates, the central bank also started buying bonds in an attempt to keep long-term borrowing costs low. The idea was to encourage businesses to borrow and spend more, to try and spur growth in the economy and create more jobs. The stimulus efforts appear to have had an impact, with the US economy showing signs of recovery of late.

That has seen the central bank scale back its key stimulus measure - the bond-buying programme also known as quantitative easing - for three months in a row.

However in its latest policy decision, the Fed said it would look at multiple factors before approving any rise in interest rates. It had previously hinted at doing so once the jobless rate fell to 6.5%. "This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labour market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial developments," it said.

Nervous markets?

US stock markets fell on the news.

Some analysts are saying the change in the Fed's guidance led to worries that interest rates may rise sooner than expected. "The Fed moved the goal post again," said David Molar, managing director at Hightower.

"It goes from a 6.5% unemployment threshold to a qualitative approach which is nebulous for the market.

"No one knows what will trigger further tapering, a pause in tapering or an increase in asset purchase. It's a major change in policy."

Mark Grant, managing director at Southwest Securities added: "What seems to be troubling the market is that even though it reiterated that it wouldn't be raising rates this year, people were put on notice that a hike is coming."

"We'll likely see some rise in short rates as a result of this, if not out across the whole curve."

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (CNN) -- China announced that it has satellite images of a large object floating in the search area for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, but Australian-led search teams found no sign of it Saturday.

Another day of intense searches by air and sea concluded for the night with no new clues to give families answers about the fate of the passengers and crew.

The object the Chinese photographed is 22.5 meters long and 13 meters wide (74 feet by 43 feet), officials said.

China said the satellite images showing the "suspected floating object" were captured four days ago, on March 18.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority said the spot of the sighting was within Saturday's search area, but that the object was not found. Searchers will take the Chinese information into consideration as they design their search for Sunday, AMSA said. The floating object was about 77 miles from where earlier satellite images spotted floating debris. At least six search flights were involved Saturday, including two private jets. Though the two civilian jets did not have radar, their role was crucial, authorities said. "It is more likely that a pair of eyes are going to identify something floating in the ocean," Australian Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss said.

Indeed, during Saturday's search it was a civil aircraft that reported sighting some small objects floating with the naked eye, including a wooden pallet, AMSA said. These objects were within a radius of 5 kilometers (3 miles).

A Royal New Zealand Air Force P3 Orion was dispatched to the area, but only reported seeing clumps of seaweed, AMSA said. Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished on March 8 with 239 people aboard destined for Beijing from Kuala Lumpur. The stated goal of the Malaysian authorities is to narrow the search area, a task that is proving difficult.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14