Wall Street Journal (05/20/15) Jon Hilsenrath

U.S. Federal Reserve officials said at their April policy meeting that they are unlikely to raise short-term interest rates in June, and they are unlikely to raise the benchmark federal funds rate from near zero until they see more improvement in the labor market and are confident inflation will rise toward their 2% target. As the economy stumbled through winter, officials indicated it was “unlikely that the data available in June would provide sufficient confirmation that the conditions for raising the target range for the federal funds rate had been satisfied, although they generally did not rule out this possibility,” according to the Fed minutes.

The Fed meets again June 16-17, and market interests are looking toward a possible rate increase in September or later. Data has been mixed, with the economy generating jobs and income for workers but not experiencing an uptick in spending or investment.