A shopper standing near shelves where packaged noodles are usually displayed in a grocery store in Round Lake Beach, Illinois, yesterday. Governor J.B. Pritzker has ordered all restaurants, bars and schools to close in response to the Covid-19 epidemic, leading to panic buying. – EPA pic, March 16, 2020.
FACED with a growing economic shutdown from the coronavirus pandemic, the US Federal Reserve on yesterday announced drastic emergency measures to shore up confidence and keep the financial sector running, including slashing the key interest rate to virtually zero. The Fed made its second emergency rate cut in less than two weeks, cutting the benchmark borrowing rate to a range of 0-0.25%, where it was during the 2008 global financial crisis, and pledged to keep it there “until it is confident that the economy has weathered recent events”.
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