The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate by 50 basis points, reducing borrowing costs for the first time since 2020. The Federal Reserve said it would lower the target for its key lending rate by 0.5 percentage points, to the range of 4.75%-5%.
Implementation Note issued September 18, 2024
Decisions Regarding Monetary Policy Implementation
The Federal Reserve has made the following decisions to implement the monetary policy stance announced by the Federal Open Market Committee in its statement on September 18, 2024:
- The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System voted unanimously to lower the interest rate paid on reserve balances to 4.9 percent, effective September 19, 2024.
- As part of its policy decision, the Federal Open Market Committee voted to direct the Open Market Desk at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, until instructed otherwise, to execute transactions in the System Open Market Account in accordance with the following domestic policy directive:”Effective September 19, 2024, the Federal Open Market Committee directs the Desk to:
- Undertake open market operations as necessary to maintain the federal funds rate in a target range of 4‑3/4 to 5 percent.
- Conduct standing overnight repurchase agreement operations with a minimum bid rate of 5 percent and with an aggregate operation limit of $500 billion.
- Conduct standing overnight reverse repurchase agreement operations at an offering rate of 4.8 percent and with a per-counterparty limit of $160 billion per day.
- Roll over at auction the amount of principal payments from the Federal Reserve’s holdings of Treasury securities maturing in each calendar month that exceeds a cap of $25 billion per month. Redeem Treasury coupon securities up to this monthly cap and Treasury bills to the extent that coupon principal payments are less than the monthly cap.
- Reinvest the amount of principal payments from the Federal Reserve’s holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage‑backed securities (MBS) received in each calendar month that exceeds a cap of $35 billion per month into Treasury securities to roughly match the maturity composition of Treasury securities outstanding.
- Allow modest deviations from stated amounts for reinvestments, if needed for operational reasons.
- Engage in dollar roll and coupon swap transactions as necessary to facilitate settlement of the Federal Reserve’s agency MBS transactions.”
- In a related action, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System voted unanimously to approve a 1/2 percentage point decrease in the primary credit rate to 5 percent, effective September 19, 2024. In taking this action, the Board approved requests to establish that rate submitted by the Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
This information will be updated as appropriate to reflect decisions of the Federal Open Market Committee or the Board of Governors regarding details of the Federal Reserve’s operational tools and approach used to implement monetary policy.
