Federal Reserve Interest Rate Hike Today

 Today, the Federal Reserve is expected to hike interest rates again by three-quarters of a percent. It's the fourth hike this year, in an attempt to drive down surging inflation. Business correspondent Alexis Christopher is joining me now for more. Good morning, Alexis. So, what can we expect from this decision and how could it affect all of our wallets this morning? Good morning, Kira. We're expecting another aggressive Federal Reserve. As you said, we're expected to be handed the fourth interest rate hike this year as the Fed continues to battle the highest inflation we have been experiencing since the early 1980s. 

So we're expecting three-quarters of a percentage point rise in the Fed's short-term interest rates today. But there are some on Wall Street who think the Fed might get even more aggressive than that and actually push interest rates up by a full 1%. And that's because the inflation data we got for the month of June was running red hot, up 9.1%. Now, we also are going to be listening for more clues about where interest rates are headed for the rest of the year. The Fed chief, Jerome Powell, will be holding a press conference this afternoon, and reporters will be putting questions to him. 

And those questions will include how much higher does he expect interest rates to go this year? And what path inflation will be on for the rest of 2022.  So are these rate hikes even working so far?  That is the big question. And the Fed is looking at the data. They continually say we are data-dependent. And if you look at some figures in the past few weeks, I think the answer is yes. We're starting to see consumer spending pulling back a little bit. Consumer confidence is now down for the third month in a row. So there are some fears there that there might be sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy of a recession happening, and the housing market is really going through it right now. Kiera some are actually saying that home construction is in a recession at the moment. 

We got new home sales this week, and existing home sales, both of them falling as mortgage rates continue to rise. We now have the 30-year fixed mortgage nationwide averaging about 6%. That's the highest we've seen in decades.  And we've been talking about gas prices and the fact that they've fallen from record highs to 433 a gallon now, which is down, what? Sixteen cents from last week and last month. Could that be a sign that inflation has peaked? We are hopeful. Something we didn't show in that graphic is where prices were last year, and we were paying 315 a gallon for gas last year. 

So this has been a huge problem for Americans' household budgets. Inflation, a big part of inflation is energy prices right now. And what's happening at the pump, the fact that prices are coming down and actually people are driving a little bit less, even though it is the summer driving season, those high prices, not just for gas, but for groceries, rent, and just about everything else, as people starting to think about how they're spending their money, they might be taking some shorter trips. So the fact that gas prices are coming down and some believe they could trend lower through the rest of the summer is definitely a good sign for inflation, for sure. 

 Well, and the aim is obviously to bring the prices down. But there are concerns, right, that raising these rates could lead to a recession? We talk about this every time, assuming that we're not already in one, of course. So can the Fed pull off a soft landing   The Federal Reserve seems to think they can? More and more economists believe we are going to be able to dodge a bullet here and not have the economy fall into a recession. One typical thing you see with a recession is the job market. Lots and lots of layoffs. That's something we don't have right now. We have a very strong job market. We still have about two open positions for every person that's looking for a job. So if there is a recession, it might not be the garden variety kind of a recession, and it might be a very mild and short-lived one