Jerome Powell's Fed Hike Day

Jerome Powell is expected to hike rates by another quarter point to 5%, the highest since right before the 2008 financial crisis. He's telegraphing this will be the last hike for a while, after which the Fed repairs to its mountaintop layer to survey all that it has crushed. Going by recent inflation numbers, this final quarter point kick in the teeth won't kill inflation, which has metastasized in recent months at about 4.5% core. Yet more regional banks are crashing this morning with distressed Western Alliance and PacWest currently sporting double-digit declines on their 20% drops yesterday.