Federal Reserve officials expect to raise interest rates three times next year as the US central bank adopts a more aggressive approach to tame the highest levels of inflation for decades. The more hawkish interest rate forecasts were published alongside a plan to double the pace at which the Fed “tapers” the huge bond-buying program it put in place at the start of the coronavirus pandemic. It will begin cutting purchases by $30bn a month in January, putting it on track to stop adding to the size of its balance sheet by the end of March — several months earlier than initially expected — and begin to raise interest rates in the months thereafter.

FedEx has laid bare the scale of the online shopping boom in the run-up to the US holiday season peak, reporting its highest quarterly sales on record after the logistics group handled millions of additional packages and implemented surcharges on shipments. Earnings released on Thursday showed FedEx Ground, the company’s small-package ground delivery business in North America, handled an average of 12.3m packages every day in the three months to the end of November, up from 9.6m for the same period a year ago.

McDonald’s announced Thursday it has settled its lawsuit against former CEO Steve Easterbrook, clawing back his severance payment valued at $105 million. The fast-food giant first brought a suit against its disgraced former chief executive in August 2020, claiming that he lied during the company’s internal probe into his behavior before his firing.