Most Federal Reserve officials said another interest rate hike would likely be appropriate this year, minutes of the September 15–16 meeting showed on Wednesday. US stocks and gold barely moved on the release. Bitcoin was the exception.
The minutes cover the meeting where the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the Fed’s rate-setting panel, lifted its benchmark rate by 0.25 percentage point to a range of 3.75% to 4.00%. The 12–0 vote delivered the Fed’s first hike since 2023.
What the Fed Minutes Say About the Next Rate Hike
“Most” participants saw another increase in 2026 as likely appropriate, according to the minutes. “Some” said the risks to inflation had tilted further toward prices rising faster than expected.
Several officials judged that the current rate was not restrictive, or only mildly so. In Fed terms, restrictive means borrowing costs high enough to slow spending and cool inflation.
Several participants also said the scale of the artificial intelligence (AI) buildout, the wave of spending on data centers and chips, continued to surprise them.
Why Stocks and Gold Barely Moved on the Fed Minutes
The S&P 500, the benchmark index of 500 large US companies, sat at about 7,801 in the first five minutes after the 2 p.m. ET release, down 0.02%, TradingView data showed.
Gold held near $4,110 an ounce. It had touched about $4,125 roughly 45 minutes before the minutes came out.
Little in the document was new.
The view that one more hike was coming had already been published on September 16, when the Fed’s projections showed the median official expecting one more quarter-point increase by year-end. Sixteen of 18 officials pencilled in at least one.
The minutes also predate the September jobs report. Employers added about 29,000 jobs that month against forecasts near 90,000, and unemployment rose to 4.2%.
Traders had already cut the odds of an October hike to roughly 20%, from about 55% a week earlier. Banks such as J.P. Morgan expect one more December hike instead.
Why Bitcoin Was the Only Market That Reacted
Bitcoin (BTC) rose from about $83,159 to $83,306 on Binance in the first five minutes after the release, a 0.18% gain. That was the largest move among the three markets.
The bounce followed a slide. Bitcoin had traded near $83,600 around 12:30 p.m. ET before falling to about $83,050 shortly before 2 p.m. ET, the same chart showed.
Unlike the stock market, Bitcoin trades around the clock and had already sold off into the release. Rate decisions have been driving crypto flows: investors put $3.55 billion into crypto funds in the week after the September hike, the largest weekly crypto inflows of 2026.
What Comes Before the October 28 Fed Decision
Officials have split in public since the meeting. New York Fed President John Williams called one more hike this year reasonable. Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan argued at least two may be needed. Governor Michelle Bowman said she sees no urgent need to act.
Long-term Treasury yields recently hit their highest since 2002, a move tied to the $400 billion metals selloff earlier on Wednesday.
The Fed meets next on October 27–28, days before the US midterm elections. September consumer price data, due October 14, will be the last major inflation reading before that decision. Track the Bitcoin price today as the data lands.
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