Economy... This is your Intervention...

The Fed cut the Key Interest Rate to .25%, that is 1/4 percent or 25 basis points... Sounds like Good news!

This should mean the prime rate mirrors the drop and reduces down to 3.25% from 4%.  These are unseen rates and will hopefully spur some lending in the immediate future.

The looming threat that I see, is of course, "What goes down, must come up!" and eventually these rates will boomerang back.  Until then, the dollar needs to strengthen, real estate needs to solidify and jobs need to bottom out and begin to recover...

I guess this moment may be the economies Intervention... We love you too much, to let you do this to yourself!

Fed cuts target for key rate to record low Fed cuts target for key interest rate to record low, pledges to use all available tools.

Tuesday December 16, 2008, 2:38 pm EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Federal Reserve has cut its target for a key interest rate to the lowest level on record and pledged to use "all available tools" to combat a severe financial crisis and prolonged recession.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues also pledged to use "all available tools" as they struggle to contain a financial crisis that is the worst since the 1930s and a recession that is already the longest in a quarter-century.

The Fed also made clear that it intends to keep the funds rate at extremely low levels. "The committee anticipates that weak economic conditions are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for some time," the central bank's panel that sets interest rates said in a statement.

The Fed's decision is expected to be quickly matched by a reduction in banks' prime lending rate, the benchmark rate for millions of business and consumer loans. Before the Fed announcement, the prime rate stood at 4 percent.

The Fed has never pushed its target for the federal funds rate as low as zero to 0.25 percent. The lowest target rate before had been 1 percent, a level seen only once before in the past half-century.

Given how low interest rates are, the central bank said it planned to use a variety of unconventional methods to flood the banking system with credit and drive interest rates lower. "The Federal Reserve will employ all available tools to promote the resumption of sustainable economic growth and to preserve price stability," the Fed said.