Interest: Interest Rate and Ever-Tighter

interest: First to recognise the danger was the US Federal Reserve, which slammed the brakes on ever-tighter monetary policy, according to The Guardian. No more interest rate rises this year and possibly a review of the Fed's sale of 3.7tn of assets, the unloading of which has done so much in the last 18 months to push up long-term interest rates charged by US banks and other lenders to commercial borrowers. The new year message from the International Monetary Fund IMF and a string of similarly gloomy commentators struck a chord, apparently within weeks of sounding the alarm that a global recession and possibly a credit crunch to rival 2008's was on the way. The People's Bank of China brought similar cheer to investors after it loosened credit rules to allow small- and medium-sized businesses to borrow more freely. Politicians played their part. Almost overnight, an economy that was slowing dramatically and taking Germany, the US and much of Asia down with it, was back on the path to solid growth. (news.financializer.com). As reported in the news.