— This is the script of CNBC's news report for China's CCTV on March 19, Thursday.
The Federal Reserve fired its first warning shot Wednesday that it is going to start hiking interest rates-sometime.
As the global investment community focused its attention on the U.S. central bank, the Fed Open Market Committee lived up to expectations: It dropped the word "patient" from its post-meeting statement, an indication, subtle though it may be, that the era of zero interest rates is about to end.
[JANET YELLEN] "Just because we removed the word 'patient' from the statement doesn't mean we're going to be impatient."
But the mostly dovish statement made little fanfare over eliminating the word, and in fact stated specifically that "an increase in the target range for the federal funds rate remains unlikely at the April FOMC meeting," a phrase missing from previous communiques.
Janus Capital's Bill Gross explained why the Federal Reserve's latest statement has caused him to push back his rate-hike projection and said after "patience", Fed's new word is -- "prudence".
[BILL GROSS] "They could express the potential for inflation, the potential for global weakness and international developments which is code basically for a strong dollar. And they expressed concerns abt the employment situation not threatening inflation going forward. So prudence is our new word and perhaps they lag that june hike that I thought was going to occur."
"The Committee anticipates that it will be appropriate to raise the target range for the federal funds rate when it has seen further improvement in the labor market and is reasonably confident that inflation will move back to its 2 percent objective over the medium term," the statement said.
"Patient" or not in the words of the closely watched statement, the Fed seems in no hurry to tighten.
Indeed, expectations for the pace of future hikes changed considerably. The so-called dot plot, which maps members' expectations of rates over the next several years, shifted lower to indicate a slower trajectory of tightening than originally anticipated.
[David Roche] "i'm getting weary of central banks redfiinging nad parsing the english language i wish they'd get on with some sort of vision to manage monetary policy. I guess my bottom line is you won't get normalatizaiton in june, you may get it in september, and you'll certainlty get it before the end of the year."
Markets reacted immediately after the release of Fed's annoucement.
The US dollar nursed hefty losses on Thursday, and suffered its biggest one-day fall in six years.
The stock market, however, got a boost, with the Dow up 100 points 5 minutes after the statement was issued.
Commodities, including spot gold and oil also surged.
Yields on US 10-year Treasurys fell below 2 percent for the first time since Feb. 25.
CNBC's Qian Chen, reporting from Singapore.
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