The December consumer price index came in slightly stronger than expected, perhaps eliminating the possibility of a rate cut in March, analysts said.

The Fed, financial markets, the upcoming election and AI took center stage on at the Executives' Club of Chicago's Annual Economic Outlook panel.

The muni market enters this year from a relative position of strength, said Jeff Lipton, managing director and head of municipal research and strategy at Oppenheimer.

Musalem, an economist, is a former executive vice president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

This year has favorable potential for 1Q activity, noting an unusually large scheduled reinvestment potential in January and February, including $19 billion of maturities plus calls in January and $24.9 billion in February, noted MMA's Matt Fabian.

"A soft landing is increasingly conceivable but in no way inevitable," Barkin, who will vote on policy decisions this year, said in the text of a speech Wednesday.

COVID made predicting the economic future even more difficult. While calls for a recession and rate cuts for this year didn't pan out, here's what experts see for 2024.

"It's important that we start to move rates down," Harker said Wednesday in a local radio interview. "We don't have to do it too fast, and we're not going to do it right away."

The Federal Open Market Committee meets Dec. 12 and 13 and in addition to their statement, they will issue a Summary of Economic Projections.

Federal Reserve Bank of New York President John Williams said it's too early for officials to begin thinking about cutting rates as soon as March as they consider whether policy is restrictive enough to get inflation back to 2%.