Jay Bryson News

Inflation has pulled back significantly from its pandemic-era peak. In fact, some categories have fallen into outright deflation, meaning consumers are seeing their prices decline instead of rise.

Recession fears led to a sharp stock-market selloff in recent days, with the S&P 500 index posting a 3% loss Monday, its worst in almost two years.

A cooling job market gives the Federal Reserve room to keep interest rates on hold in December and reinforces market views that the central bank is done with the most aggressive hiking campaign in four decades.

Treasury yields as markets grew more convinced the Federal Reserve was done with its aggressive monetary policy tightening cycle after it left rates unchanged. The Fed on Wednesday held interest rates steady as widely expected, as policymakers struggled to determine whether financial conditions may be sufficiently tight to control inflation. However, Fed Chair Jerome Powell acknowledged that a recent market-driven rise in Treasury bond yields, home mortgage rates and other financing costs could have their own impact on the economy as long as they persist. The decision lifted sentiment in Wall Street, which spilled over into the Asia day, giving a small boost to the risk-sensitive Australian and New Zealand dollars. The Aussie rose 0.5% to a three-week high of $0.6426, while the kiwi similarly jumped more than 0.5% to hit a two-week top of $0.58825. The dollar edged broadly lower alongside U.S. Treasury yields which touched multi-week lows in early Asia trade.

Black families saw their wealth grow more than that of non-Black households during the pandemic, but the racial wealth gap is still vast, a new study showed.