If British bookies are betting on whether or not the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates next week (and maybe some of them do, since they take bets on practically everything else), I imagine the odds would be greatly in favor of a rate rise.
All the hints, winks and nods from the Fed—and the outpourings from the platoon of pundits who analyze the U.S. central bank’s every breath—lean in the direction of a rise. At the same time, the European Central Bank (ECB) is leaning in the other direction. To combat persistent economic sluggishness in the Eurozone, the central bankers across the Atlantic recently stomped down even harder on the monetary accelerator and pushed interest rates even further into negative territory: lowering the rate they pay (now, making it what they charge) banks to keep money on deposit at the ECB to negative 0.3% from negative 0.2%.
