CD Rates Continue to Fall After Federal Reserve Ties Policy to Specific Benchmark for Unemployment

NEW YORK, Dec. 18, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- RateWatch, a premier banking data and analytics service owned by TheStreet, Inc. (Nasdaq:TST), reported today that interest rates for savings products generally decreased over the previous week with the average national rate on a 1 month, 1 year, 2 year, 4 year, and 5 year CDs falling 0.01 percent based on data collected from over 90,000 financial institution locations.

The Federal Reserve has kept its target federal funds rate in a range of zero to 0.25% since late 2008 and last Wednesday said it anticipated "that this exceptionally low range for the federal funds rate will be appropriate at least as long as the unemployment rate remains above 6-1/2 percent, inflation between one and two years ahead is projected to be no more than a half percentage point above the Committee's 2 percent longer-run goal, and longer-term inflation expectations continue to be well anchored."

This is the first time that the central bank has tied its rate policy to a specific benchmark for the unemployment rate.

The Fed also said that it would continue to purchase agency mortgage backed securities at a pace of $40 billion a month, and that it would continue buying long-term U.S. Treasury securities "initially" at a pace of $45 billion a month during 2013. This stance will be even more "highly accommodative" than it has been during 2012, because the central bank will stop making concurrent sales of short-term Treasuries, adding further downward pressure to long-term rates.

NATIONAL AVERAGE RESULTS - $10K

TOP RATE ISSUERS - $10K

This is a list of issuers with top interest rates. The issuer's Financial Strength Rating is an independent, unbiased evaluation of quarterly regulatory statements. Institutions are assigned a letter grade of A-E with "A" representing the highest rating based on a review of many aspects of financial safety including capitalization, asset quality, profitability and liquidity. For more information, visit www.weissratings.com/help/what-our-ratings-mean.aspx. Information is believed to be accurate, but not guaranteed.

Financial Strength Rating: A=Excellent, B=Good, C=Fair, D=Weak, E=Very Weak
Plus sign "+" = top of range, Minus sign "-" = bottom of range

Data is surveyed weekly with averages calculated each Monday afternoon from RateWatch's unbiased national interest rate survey of over 90,000 financial institution locations across the United States.

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