The U.S. Federal Reserve on Wednesday said it will not raise interest rates until at least late 2014, even later than investors expected, in an effort to support a sluggish economic recovery.

COMMENTS:

ANDREW COX, G10 STRATEGIST, CITIFX, NEW YORK

The only change that really pops out and that's significant is removing mid-2013 and revising that to through late 2014. I think it's no surprise to anyone. I don't see anything really new in here and the market had already moved well beyond the mid-2013 language.

GENNADIY GOLDBERG, INTEREST-RATE STRATEGIST, 4CAST, INC., NEW YORK

It's pretty much what the market was expecting, the biggest change obviously was the 'late 2014' statement. The only other more interesting part of the statement was 'the committee expects to maintain a highly accommodative stance to monetary policy.' That's geared obviously toward zero interest rates, but it also means they might support the market through additional quantitative easing. It's keeping hopes of QE3 well alive.

BRIAN DOLAN, CHIEF STRATEGIST, FOREX.COM, BEDMINSTER, NEW JERESY

This is dollar negative. Extending low rates until late 2014 is longer than markets were expecting. The Fed is not indicating any sign of quantitative easing, though. I think what they are seeing is that the rate of growth is not sufficient to bring down the unemployment rate. The biggest pullback could be in the dollar/yen, which had been the biggest gainer today.

DAVID SLOAN, ECONOMIST, IFR ECONOMICS, A UNIT OF THOMSON REUTERS

The FOMC's statement is notable for one major change from the last one delivered on December 13, it now expects exceptionally low levels for the Fed Funds rate at least through late 2014, rather at least through mid-2013, thus extending the period by around 18 months. Markets had expected the SEP due later today to see no tightening until 2014, but this statement shows that any 2014 is expected to come late in the year. This is a more dovish statement than expected. All voted for the statement with the exception of Lacker, the one incoming voting hawk, who preferred to omit the description of the time period.

Otherwise the statement makes only subtle changes from the previous one. Business fixed investment is stated to have slowed rather than appears to be increasing less rapidly. The statement still sees housing as depressed despite some recent positive signs.

OMER ESINER, CHIEF MARKET ANALYST, COMMONWEALTH FOREIGN EXCHANGE, WASHINGTON D.C.

The fact they expect to keep rates at these levels through late 2014 is somewhat bearish for the dollar.

(Americas Economics and Markets Desk)

Quantitative easing