Gradual adjustment tends to characterize periods of rate increases as well as periods of decreases. Even the policy tightening that occurred during 1994-95, though distinctly more rapid than most episodes of rate adjustment, involved seven steps over a period of twelve months, with an ultimate increase in the policy rate of 300 basis points.
Of these increases in the policy rate, three were of 25 basis points, three were of 50 basis points, and one was an unusually large 75 basis points. More recently, the eleven-month tightening cycle that began in June 1999 involved five increases of 25 basis points and one of 50 basis points.