NEW YORK, (Reuters) – Federal Reserve officials “generally agreed” last month to reduce $60 billion per month U.S. central banks Treasury holdings and 35 billion its mortgage-backed securities holdings. The amounts will be phased in over a three-month period “or moderately longer,” according the minutes of the March 15-16 policy conference.

The minutes of the meeting, released on Wednesday, showed that participants “generally agreed” that MBS would need to be sold after balance sheet runoff is “well underway.”

The minutes stated that no decision had been made but officials made significant progress and may “begin to reduce the balance sheet as soon as the conclusion of the May 3-4) policy meeting.

STORY:

MARKET REACTION:

STOCKS – The prolonged losses were 1.53% higher after briefly paring

BONDS, The 10-year Treasury Note yield rose to 2.614%. 2.52444% declined for the 2-year note.

DOLLAR – The greater gain is 0.26%

COMMENTS:

ALAN LANCZ, PRESIDENT, ALAN B LANCZ & ASSOCIATES, TOLEDO, OHIO

    “Looks like they delayed a 50-point increase because of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which makes sense. There isn’t really anything that’s earth-shaking. People are reading the news and realizing that it doesn’t represent a significant change of stance. Yesterday’s (news was) more important to investors than the minutes. “I don’t believe there is anything that could cause any change in sentiment.

TIM GHRISKEY, SENIOR PORTFOLIO STRATEGIST, INGALLS & SNYDER, NEW YORK

“There’s nothing new here from what I see, and that’s probably why the market is not reacting. We have rate increases ahead of ourselves, as well as a shrinking budget. The Fed is determined to rein in inflation, and we just hope and pray that there will there will be a soft landing of the economy and not a hard landing that sends us into a recession.”