BLOOMBERG (NEW YORK) – The U.S. Federal Reserve stuck with its forecast to raise interest rates again this year, saying hurricane damage won’t derail an otherwise healthy expansion.

In a statement, the Fed set October to start shrinking its US$4.5 trillion balance sheet. As expected, policy makers left the current benchmark interest rate unchanged in a range of 1 percent to 1.25 percent.

The Fed’s decision to exit from balance-sheet policies comes a decade after the global financial crisis began to tip the economy into a recession at the end of 2007. The reduction in assets will be slow – just US$10 billion a month to start.

The decision to set the first balance sheet roll-offs for October was in line with the expectations of a majority of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News ahead of the meeting. Economists had also forecast that Fed policy makers would maintain their projection for one more rate increase this year, and take that action in mid-December.

U.S. interest rates are closely watched around the world, as they directly impact local currency interest rates in many countries.

Singapore property investors are one of the beneficiaries of the low interest rates. Prices of condominiums in Singapore have been trending up in this low interest rate environment.

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