Chip Somodevilla/Getty
Federal Reserve Board Chairman Jerome Powell testifies before the House Financial Services Committee.
In a statement due at 2 p.m. ET, the Federal Reserve is expected to announce that it decided to raise interest rates again.
After a two-day meeting, the Federal Open Market Committee likely voted to raise its benchmark Fed funds rate by 25 basis points to a range of 1.50% to 1.75%. It would be the sixth rate increase since late-2015, as America's central bank continues to back away from emergency policies that helped heal the economy after the Great Recession a decade ago.
Over the next few weeks, this 0.25% increase will impact credit cards, adjustable-rate mortgages, car loans, and other credit lines that don't have fixed rates. Savers could also earn higher interest on their accounts, although banks have been sluggish about keeping up with Fed hikes.
This week's meetings were the first presided over by the new Fed Chairman Jerome Powell. He will hold his first press conference at 2:30 p.m. ET.
Powell had quite a dramatic first day on the job. On February 5, the Dow Jones industrial average had its biggest-ever point drop after an unexpected jump in wages signaled that inflation was surging.
The data was eventually revised lower. And in later Congressional testimony, Powell said there was little evidence that inflation was accelerating.
But it's now more crucial that the Fed doesn't make a policy misstep. Hike too quickly, and you choke demand for borrowing and spending. Move too slowly, and the economy can overheat.
The Fed will release updated projections for rates, economic growth, and inflation. The big question is whether Fed officials add one more rate hike to their projection for the year, bringing the total to four.
"We expect a fairly hawkish hike from the Fed on Wednesday," Charles Himmelberg, Goldman Sachs' cohead of global markets research, said in a note on Monday.
"The Summary of Economic Projections is likely to show higher GDP growth projections for 2018, 2019, and longer-run, as well as a lower unemployment path and a modest inflation overshoot in 2020."
A key reason why that's plausible is since the last Fed meeting, the GOP approved major fiscal stimuli through $1.5 trillion in tax cuts and $300 billion in additional government spending.
We'll have full details of the Fed's announcement at the top of the hour. Refresh this page for updates.