For more than two years – even before COVID-19 became a global pandemic that collapsed economic and social activity for most of 2020 and that continues to strain health care systems and keep pressure on a variety of economic forces – I’ve been writing about the wisdom in being very selective about the investments you […]
Read MoreFederal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell speaks during Wednesday’s live-streamed news conference. Michael Nagle/Bloomberg Inflation will ease markedly while interest rates remain historically low and negative in real terms, even as the labor market returns to full employment, according to the latest economic projections from the Federal Reserve. This would be the best of all economic […]
Read MoreAll eyes were on Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell as the market digested the news Wednesday on what the central bank will do to keep the economy rebounding from the pandemic while countering the hot inflation that has consumers’ wallets sizzling. Market observers were betting the Fed will conclude its bond buying — a move […]
Read More(Bloomberg) — Federal Reserve officials intensified their battle against the hottest inflation in a generation by shifting to an earlier end of their asset-buying program and signaling they favor raising interest rates in 2022 at a faster pace than economists were expecting. Heralding one of the most hawkish policy pivots in years, the central bank […]
Read MoreA pivot is defined as a turn or a twist. Its safe to say there will be twists and turns on Wednesday as Fed Chairman Jerome Powell is widely expected to adopt a more hawkish stance in his postmeeting news conference Wednesday. On display will be “the limits of Fed hawkishness,” said David Kelly, chief […]
Read MoreFederal Reserve Board Chairman Jerome Powell. Brendan Smialowski / AFP via Getty Images The bond market is signaling that the Federal Reserve will soon have to abruptly lift interest rates, and that such a move could damage economic demand. Changes in bond yields suggest that this year’s surge in inflation has stuck around long enough […]
Read MoreFederal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell at a U.S. House Financial Services Committee hearing in Washington. Al Drago/Bloomberg Was Jerome Powell channeling Paul Volcker this past week by admitting that inflation has ceased being transitory? Or will he wind up being more like Alan Greenspan, facing a conundrum if the bond market fails to follow the […]
Read MoreFederal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. Al Drago/AFP via Getty Images Just a week after he was nominated for a second term as Federal Reserve chairman, Jerome Powell sounded unfamiliar. He said it was time to retire the word “transitory” that he and many other officials have long used to describe building inflation, signaling in testimony […]
Read MoreThe Biden administration looks set to soon announce its pick for who will lead the nation’s economic steward: the Federal Reserve. The White House appears to be weighing two options: keeping Jerome Powell as Fed chair or replacing him with current Fed Governor Lael Brainard. Both reportedly met with President Joe Biden earlier in the […]
Read More5 wise money moves before the Fed starts raising interest rates again Chairman Jerome Powell (pictured) and the other policymakers at the Federal Reserve just said again, after their recent November meeting, that they’ll keep holding a key interest rate near zero. Though the economy has been making gains, the officials want to sit tight […]
Read MorePreparation pays dividends. Stock-market investors took the Federal Reserve’s decision Wednesday to begin tapering its monthly bond purchases without a hitch. “This taper was probably the best telegraphed or advertised move in monetary policy history,” said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B Riley-National, in a phone interview. That’s in contrast to 2013, when the Fed’s […]
Read MoreThe headlines of the story about Wednesday’s Federal Reserve policy meeting have already been written. The devil, as they say, will be in the details. On the likely news, it is a “foregone conclusion” the Fed will announce Wednesday that a tapering of asset purchases will begin later this month, according to Michael Gapen, chief […]
Read More(Bloomberg) — Scott Peng knows trouble when he sees it — and right now he detects it all over markets thanks to an oncoming interest-rate “tsunami.” The Advocate Capital Management executive — who helped uncover the biggest scandal in modern banking with a damning 2008 report on Libor manipulation — has a plan. He’s launching […]
Read MorePhoto by Pepi Stojanovski on Unsplash What happens when the Fed tapers? That is the billion (or trillion) dollar question. Before we delve into the possible outcome(s) though, we must first understand what tapering means. In response to the coronavirus pandemic, the Federal Reserve slashed interest rates to zero in March 2020 to help bolster […]
Read More(Bloomberg) — Morgan Stanley Chief Executive Officer James Gorman is girding for rate hikes, and he says markets are ready for them. “You’ve got to prick this bubble a little bit,” Gorman said Thursday in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “Money is a bit too free and available right now.” Gorman pointed to wage increases, […]
Read More