US Federal Reserve officials have signalled that they may be ready to launch a new bond buying programme when they next meet in September.
The goal would be to try to lower long-term interest rates to encourage more borrowing and spending.
Minutes of the July 31-August 1 policy meeting released last night did not explicitly say what action the Fed would most likely take.
But they hint that the bank is preparing to begin more bond buying.
The minutes show that Fed officials spoke at the meeting with increased urgency about the need to provide more help for the still-weak US economy. Many felt further support would be needed "fairly soon" unless the economy improved significantly.
The Fed has already sought to drive down long-term rates by buying more than $2 trillion in Treasury bonds and mortgage-backed securities in two previous rounds of bond purchases. The purchases are called "quantitative easing."
Based on the minutes, one economist said he thought the likelihood of further quantitative easing had risen from evenly split to as high as a 70% chance that the Fed will make that move when it meets September 12-13.
The minutes also show many officials favour pushing the timetable for any increase in record-low short-term rates beyond the Fed's current target of late 2014 at the earliest. Some economists think the target will be extended to mid-2015.
The Fed releases minutes of its private discussions three weeks after each meeting. After it meets in September, Fed policymakers will also update their economic forecasts, and Chairman Ben Bernanke will hold a news conference.
Economists said the minutes suggested that if the Fed does launch a new bond buying programme, it will not set a target amount, as it has in the past. Rather, the Fed could keep a new programme open-ended so it could continue to buy bonds until it saw a significant decline in the unemployment rate, now at 8.3%.
Even if the Fed announces another round of bond purchases, some economists have questioned how much it might help. They note that mortgage rates and other key borrowing rates are already near record lows.
After its August meeting, the Fed announced no changes in its policies. But in a statement afterward, it appeared to signal a growing willingness to take further steps to boost the economy if it does not improve.
The Fed noted that growth had slowed in the first half of the year. In particular, it pointed to lacklustre job growth and consumer spending. The issue of whether the Fed will announce any major moves in September was thrown into some doubt by economic improvements since its last meeting. Gains have been made in such areas as hiring, housing and consumer spending.
Many analysts are looking to a speech by Bernanke on August 31 at an annual Fed conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to provide further guidance on any new actions.
In the view of some analysts, the Fed might still want to put off any major new bond-purchase programme so it would have something in reserve in case the economy goes off a "fiscal cliff" at the end of the year. That is when tax increases and deep spending cuts will take effect unless Congress reaches a budget agreement.
The Congressional Budget Office warned that if the fiscal crisis remained unresolved all next year, it would probably tip the US economy into a recession. The CBO estimated that the economy would shrink 0.5% in 2013. Unemployment would rise to around 9% by late next year as a result of the spending cuts and tax increases, the CBO said.
The US economy grew at a lacklustre annual rate of 1.5% in the three months from July to September - even slower than the 2% growth rate from January through March. Many economists think growth in the second half of this year will remain around 2% - too weak to lower the unemployment rate.
