The daily business briefing: December 13, 2017

The Fed wraps up its meeting with a rate hike widely expected, GOP negotiators near a deal on their tax overhaul, and more

Janet Yellen on Capitol Hill
(Image credit: Zach Gibson/Getty Images)

1. Fed expected to hike interest rates at end of Wednesday meeting

Federal Reserve policy makers wrap up their two-day meeting on Wednesday, and they are widely expected to bump up interest rates by a quarter percent for the third time this year. The meeting is Janet Yellen's last as chair. Her successor, Fed Governor Jerome Powell, said during his recent confirmation hearing that he had "no sense of an overheating economy," suggesting openness to speeding up rate increases as long as the economy continues to strengthen and inflation remains in an acceptable zone. When the Fed releases its statement at 2 p.m., analysts will be looking for indications of how the Fed expects the GOP's proposed corporate and individual tax cuts to affect the economy and the central bank's plans for more interest rate reductions in 2018.

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Harold Maass, The Week US

Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.