The U.S. Federal Reserve began its two-day policy meeting Tuesday with speculation that the central bank is likely to end the asset purchase stimulus on the back of the improvement in labor market.
The Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed's policy-setting panel, including Fed chief Janet Yellen, already said last month it will terminate the quantitative easing program this month if economic data permit.
The Fed introduced the program in September 2012 that provided a massive amount of money by buying financial assets in the market to help prop up the sagging U.S. economy, saying it would continue with it until the job market improves "substantially."
The jobless rate last month sank to a six-year low of 5.9 percent, compared with 7.8 percent, which was logged when the Fed launched the stimulus.
Even if it ends the liquidity injection program, the Fed is expected to keep the ultralow short-term interest rate through the policy-setting meeting that will end Wednesday.
The Fed kept the market guessing about when it will raise the interest rate, which is currently set at zero to 0.25%, in FOMC meetings earlier this year, simply saying, it will maintain the level "for a considerable time" after the asset purchase program ends.
The Fed introduced the asset purchasing program in September 2012 as a third round of quantitative easing, dubbed QE3.
It first purchased $40 billion in federal agency mortgage-backed securities each month and ratcheted up the size of the accommodative easing program three months later, deciding to additionally buy $45 billion of U.S. government bonds.
The Fed has scaled back the program in steps since January and the amount of asset purchase fell to $15 billion this month.