Your Money

Last week, Federal Reserve officials voted unanimously to leave its benchmark interest rate unchanged at a 22-year high. In his comments, Chairman Powell repeatedly highlighted how much inflation has fallen rather than emphasizing the economy’s recent strength. With its policy, officials have been trying to balance two risks: overdoing increases that cause a severe downturn and underdoing increases that lead to a reacceleration of inflation.

There is a lag in the effect of policy decisions, and hikes from a year ago are just starting to impact current indicators. This is some of the recent data that built the case for a pause:

1. Economic activity picked up, defying expectations of an imminent slowdown.
2. Inflation continued cooling. Core inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy, hit a 2.8% annualized rate over the April-to-September period.
3. Financial conditions have tightened amid a swift run-up in longer-dated Treasury yields. Borrowing costs continue to rise for households and businesses. which could slow economic growth. For example, the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage has hovered close to 8%.

Fed Extends Pause on Rate Hikes but Keeps Door Open to Moving Higher
by Nick Timiraos

Your Life

Researchers such as Dr. Christine Greer and Dr. Richard Isaacson, both from the Institute of Neurodegenerative Disease in Boca Ratan, FL, have been exploring how the eye may help diagnose Alzheimer’s before symptoms begin. The disease is well advanced by the time memory and behavior are affected. It starts in the brain decades before the first symptoms of memory loss. Because you can see directly into the nervous system by looking into the back of the eye, toward the optic nerve and retina, you can see signs of cognitive decline earlier. If doctors can identify Alzheimer’s in its earliest stages, people could make healthy lifestyle choices and control their modifiable risk factors, like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes. Also, findings may eventually lead to the development of imaging techniques that allow us to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease earlier and more accurately and monitor its progression noninvasively by looking through the eye.

Alzheimer’s first signs may appear in your eyes, study finds
by Sandee LaMotte

Complexity Simplified

Trivia