(VOVworld) – The US Federal Reserve on Wednesday raised its benchmark interest rates by 0.25% for the third time since the 2008 financial crisis. The change increases rates to a range of 0.75% to 1%.

Fed Chair Janet Yellen at the meeting in Washington on March 15 to inform the decision of raising the benchmark interest rates by 0.25%. (Photo: Xinhua/VNA)

The Fed had been expected to raise rates after a robust February jobs report, solid pay gains, rising inflation, and a dip in the unemployment rate to 4.7%.

Federal Reserve policymakers said there will be two more hikes this year.

Rates were cut to near-zero in December 2008 and it was seven years before they were increased by a quarter percentage point in December 2015, increasing again by 0.25% a year later.

Fed Chair Janet Yellen said the committee judged that a "modest increase" in the rate was appropriate "in light of the economy's solid progress."