- No rate hike, no rate cut: Federal funds rate maintained at 3.50%–3.75%.

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- Vote: Passed 11:1, only Waller dissented (opposed slowing quantitative tightening).
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- Core reasons: Middle East conflict pushing up oil prices, inflation rebound (core PCE around 3%); weakening employment (February non-farm -92,000, unemployment rate 4.4%), under stagflation pressure can only wait and see.

II. Changes in rate hike expectations (key)

- March meeting: Market pricing shows rate hike probability only about 1%, almost impossible.
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- Next 3 months: Rate hike probability about 25%, first time exceeding rate cut probability (20%), but still dominated by "maintaining status quo".
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- Year-end path: Mainstream institutions delayed first rate cut from June to September or even year-end; dot plot shows year-end rate cut expectations compress significantly, even risk of zeroing out.

III. Federal Reserve attitude (hawkish bias)

- Statement deleted "balanced risks", emphasized rising uncertainty in outlook.
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- Clarified: will not hastily ease due to short-term supply shocks (such as oil prices).
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- Slowing quantitative tightening (QT): Treasury runoff cap reduced from $25 billion to $5 billion, MBS unchanged.

IV. Market impact (brief)

- US dollar, US Treasury yields favored; gold, US stocks under pressure.
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- Global central banks' rate cut expectations universally pushed back. #BTC #ETH