Fed to the Rescue as Gulf Central Banks Get to Cut Rates at Last - Bloomberg

Fed to the Rescue as Gulf Central Banks Get to Cut Rates at Last - Bloomberg:

More than four years after the oil-price crash, Gulf Arab policy makers can finally count on support from the Federal Reserve to add fuel to their fragile economic recovery.

Central banks in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain cut their benchmark interest rates on Wednesday by 25 basis points following a similar decision by the Fed. Kuwait kept its discount rate unchanged at 3%.

Gulf central banks largely move in lockstep with the U.S. to protect their currencies’ peg to the dollar. But as the Fed raised rates nine times since 2015, they were unable to lower borrowing costs to help weather the effect of lower oil prices on their economies.