Fed Keeps Rates Steady and Projects Little Movement Ahead

WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged at its final meeting of the year and officials signaled they would wait to see how the economy fares before making another move.

Officials penciled in no rate changes next year, according to their latest set of quarterly economic projections, and saw only one move in 2021 followed by a second in 2022.

That wait-and-see outlook underlines that Chair Jerome H. Powell and his colleagues are comfortable with their current monetary policy setting, after they cut interest rates three times between July and late October. Those moves were meant to guard the economy from the fallout of President Trump’s prolonged trade war and slowing growth abroad.

Now, “the Committee will continue to monitor the implications of incoming information for the economic outlook, including global developments and muted inflation pressures,” the Fed said in its post-meeting statement.

The current stance of policy “is appropriate to support the expansion of economic activity, strong labor market conditions, and inflation near the Committee’s symmetric 2 percent objective,” the statement said. Officials dropped their previous caveat that “uncertainties around this outlook remain,” in a sign of their increasing confidence in the economy.

Mr. Powell’s colleagues lined up uniformly behind the decision to leave policy on hold this month. All 17 Fed officials were comfortable leaving rates unchanged and only four see higher rates in 2020, based on the economic projections, down from nine when the Fed released its last set of quarterly projections in September.