A Very Important Hawkish Number Appeared In The Fed's Announcement

The Federal Reserve's FOMC statement and economic forecasts are out.

One number jumped out at us. For 2014, the Federal Reserve now estimates the unemployment rate will be in the range of 6.5% to 6.8%, down from an earlier forecast of 6.7% to 7.0%.

This is noteworthy because in its December meeting, the Fed said it would use unemployment rate and inflation rate thresholds to help guide monetary policy.

Those thresholds: 6.5% unemployment rate and 2.5% inflation rate.

This suggests that the Fed may be warming up to tighter monetary policy sooner than later.