Powell said at a press conference after the interest rate meeting that the Fed “has not made any decision on whether to adjust its policy in September.”

“Our responsibility is to keep long-term inflation expectations stable and prevent one-time price increases from evolving into persistent inflation problems,” Powell said. “Higher tariffs have begun to be more clearly reflected in the prices of some commodities, but their impact on overall economic activity and inflation remains to be seen.”

This statement cooled down the market’s expectations for a rate cut in September or even another rate cut before the end of the year. Affected by Powell’s remarks, investors reassessed the timing of interest rate cuts, resulting in an increase in U.S. Treasury yields.

After Powell’s speech, interest rate futures showed traders lowered their bets on interest rate cuts, with the probability of a rate cut in September falling to just below 50% from about 65% on Tuesday.

Powell’s remarks cooled expectations for interest rate cuts, with the three major indexes mixed, and only the Nasdaq rose slightly.

As of the close, the Dow Jones Index fell 0.38% to 44,461.28 points; the S&P 500 fell 0.12% to 6,362.90 points; and the Nasdaq Index rose 0.15% to 21,129.67 points.

Large tech stocks rose and fell mixed, with Apple falling 1.05%, Microsoft rising 0.13%, Nvidia rising 2.14%, Google rising 0.40%, Amazon falling 0.35%, Meta falling 0.68%, and Tesla falling 0.67%.

Popular Chinese stocks fell generally, Nasdaq China Golden Dragon Index fell 1.82%, Alibaba fell 1.66%, JD.com fell 1.46%, Pinduoduo fell 2.16%, NIO fell 4.25%, Xpeng fell 2.01%, Ideal Auto fell 3.40%, Bilibili fell 0.71%, Baidu fell 0.99%, NetEase fell 0.92%, Tencent Music fell 2.99%.