Major central banks across the globe delivered the largest number of monthly interest rate hikes in June this year to date, indicating that further interest rate hikes may follow as the world grabbles with persistently steep inflation.
Seven of the nine central banks that oversee the 10 most heavily traded currencies decided to hike interest rates last month. “While some central banks are seeing initial progress toward lower inflation, central bankers overall continue to face a tough balancing act,” Tiffany Wilding, an economist at PIMCO, explained of this pattern.
Norway and the Bank of England surprised markets by implementing higher-than-expected interest rate hikes of 50 basis points each, while Canada and Australia both resumed their rate-hiking agendas.
The U.S. Federal Reserve instituted a pause to its rate hikes, while Sweden, Switzerland, and the European Central Bank continued to tighten their monetary policies. In total, last month’s interest rate hikes came to a combined 225 basis points.