Economic data released overnight justified the Fed Chair's continued concern about the state of the global economy, with February's reading of Japanese industrial production showing the largest one-month drop since the 2011 earthquake.
"Data support Yellen's worries about [the] world," wrote Neil Dutta, head of U.S. economics at Renaissance Macro Research. "While the manufacturing sector in China has suffered and the consumer sector has shown resilience, there have been signs that the latter may not be as bullet proof as previously thought."