RBC Royal Bank (Trinidad and Tobago) has advised its clients that due to a recent change in the United States Federal Reserve interest rate, the US$ prime interest rate will increase from 3.25 per cent per annum to 3.5 per cent per annum.
The changes will take effect next month on April 25, 2022.
The adjustment comes as a result of a vote by Federal Reserve officials last week Wednesday to lift interest rates.
Six more increases are expected by year’s end as part of an effort to slow inflation which is at its highest levels in the United States in over four decades.
The Federal Reserve will raise its benchmark federal-funds rate by a quarter percentage point to a range between 0.25 per cent and 0.5 per cent, the first rate increase since 2018.
Officials said they expect to lift the rate to nearly 2 per cent by the end of this year to a level slightly higher than the level seen before rates were brought down to near zero after the pandemic hit the US economy two years ago. Median projections show the rate rising to around 2.75 per cent by the end of 2023, which would be the highest since 2008.