Joshua Roberts/Reuters
Fed Chairman Jerome Powell
At the March 20-21 meeting, the Federal Open Market Committee voted to raise its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points to a range of 0.75% to 1%, as had been widely expected. It was the sixth hike since December 2015, and a step further away from policies that were designed to recover the economy after the Great Recession.
The Fed maintained its forecast for two more rate hikes this year, after speculation about whether budding inflation would push it towards raising its outlook to three increases. At his first press conference as Fed chairman, Jerome Powell said the committee expected tax cuts and increased government spending to only impact inflation in the second half the year.
The big issue that's dominated markets news since then has been US trade frictions with China, with both countries announcing tariffs on key products they buy from each other.
Powell said last month that trade rifts shouldn't have affected the committee's outlook at that point. Although more tariffs have been announced since then, investors will be parsing the minutes for any detail on why the committee reached that conclusion.