Oh Ben...

The market was looking good due to speculation that the FOMC would take a stance on another round of easing. In my opinion, the immediate drop after the announcement could be attributed to two things, 1) FOMC lowering their outlook and using increasingly negative language to describe the pace of recovery and 2) no firm stance on another round of stimulus. It seems to me that people started to digest the information and realized that one of the key things in that statement address inflation, which is now believed to be in line with FOMC's mandate. If we go back further, to the Fed's earlier meeting minutes, Bernanke said that there would be two things that would bring about another round of QE...one of the things he talked about was weakened growth and the other thing were concerns around deflation. So we now have one element of that equation (weak pace of recovery, slowing growth) and half of the other element as well (inflation is no longer considered a transitory concern but it is now in line with the mandate). I think that's why everything rallied in the past 10 minutes (my opinion of course). I also assume that low rates through mid-2013 is something that has already been priced in for the most part..