My belief is that the US Federal Reserve will not hike rates in March or May. Wage growth continues to be weak and growth has not hit above 2%.Core inflation is currently at 2.3% but it seems like the Fed would be content to have this figure move above their publicly stated target. For one, it cheapens the national debt by eroding its real value given the average maturity of US debt is only 5-6 years and only represents 8.9% of marketable debt. Two, higher inflation incentivizes consumers to spend to avoid an erosion in purchasing power, which boost nominal growth.Despite chairwoman Janet Yellen’s statement that waiting too long to raise rates would be “unwise,” March is very unlikely, as is, in my opinion, May. Rate hikes will still remain slow overall.Over the past week, odds of a March rate increase have come down from the low-40%’s to 27%:(Source: CME Group)The odds of at least one increase by May, however, are set at 51.7%:(Source: CME Group)Odds of at least one increase run up to 69.5% by June. For some reason, 3.4% of the market is betting on a hike in each of the next three meetings:(Source: CME Group)By January 2018, the odds of at least one rate hike increase to 94%, 71.8% of at least two, and 39% of at least three:(Source: CME Group)Overall, if we do a weighted average of these probabilities, this comes to 2.2 rate hikes in terms of market expectations.In the meantime, the fact that slightly over half the market expects at least one hike by May suggests that the lack of one will provide the following the biases in the short-term, assuming the Fed does indeed hold off until June:1. Negative for the US dollar2. Positive for gold/silver3. Positive for bonds4. Neutral to positive for stocks5. Positive for emerging markets (USD-denominated debt is cheaper)6. Supportive of continuing low volatility