(Reuters) -Federal Reserve policymakers are seen as far more likely to skip raising interest rates this week after government data Tuesday showed consumer price gains, while still too hot for comfort, slowed last month a bit more than expected.
Traders of futures tied to the Fed’s policy rate now see about a 95% chance the U.S. central bank will decide to forgo an 11th straight interest-rate hike and keep the benchmark rate at 5.00% to 5.25% on Wednesday. Before the report, traders saw about a one-in-four chance of a June rate hike.
Traders also trimmed bets on a Fed rate hike in July, overwhelmingly expected in markets before the report, which showed consumer prices rose 4% in May from a year earlier. That was the smallest annual gain in more than two years.
“The data ever so slightly tilts things towards this not just being a skip, but a full-blown hold,” said Brian Jacobsen, chief economist at Annex Wealth Management.
(Reporting by Ann Saphir and Chuck Mikolajczak, and Lucia Mutikani; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
