The idea was that providing more information about the Committee's views of the economic outlook would allow financial market prices to reflect more accurately the probable future stance of monetary policy. When the stance of policy changed, the statement disclosing the action could be and was used to provide an indication of the factors likely to influence the Committee's future decisions.
Such information, however, was not provided when the Committee decided not to change its policy since no announcement accompanied such decisions. To bridge this gap, the Committee decided at its December 1998 meeting to announce major shifts in its view about prospective developments even in cases when the current policy setting remained unchanged. This step toward additional disclosure was first implemented in May 1999.