Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is known for providing clear signals about the central bank’s next interest rate move in order to avoid roiling markets. But Wall Street was mostly clueless this week when it came to predicting how big a rate cut the Fed would deliver on Wednesday.

Most of the U.S. stock market edged lower after the Federal Reserve kicked off its efforts to prevent a recession with a bigger-than-usual cut to interest rates.

U.S. stocks shot higher on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve cut interest rates by 50 basis points, the high side of estimates for its first cut in more than four years. Citing a "greater confidence" that inflation is moving towards the central bank's 2% target,