Topic: Central Banking

“Fed Nominees Support Expanded Duties”

– July 16, 2010

“Hours before the Senate approved a far-reaching overhaul of Wall Street regulations on Thursday, President Obama’s three nominees to the board of the Federal Reserve said they were prepared to help the central bank handle its vastly expanded duties to …

READ MORE

“Economic Recovery Slower Than Expected”

– July 14, 2010

“Federal Reserve leaders marked down their expectations for growth and inflation last month, concluding that the economic recovery is proceeding more slowly than they had thought in the spring but that the slowdown did not warrant new policy actions. B …

READ MORE

Money and Banking: The American Experience

– July 14, 2010

The style of Money and Banking: The American Experience is one of article and comment. An author provides an article on the issues of money and banking in the U.S. and another academic provides a comment on said article. The table of contents is as fol …

READ MORE

“Your Money Back”

– July 12, 2010

“Is Ron Paul’s suggestion that the Federal Reserve be eliminated a “fringe position,” as Josh Barro suggested in the June 21 issue of National Review (“Mend the Fed”)? It depends on what “fringe” means. If it means simply that a large majority disagree …

READ MORE

The Age of Turbulence

– July 7, 2010

“Alan Greenspan shares the story of his life first simply with an eye toward doing justice to the extraordinary amount of history he has experienced and shaped. But his other goal is to draw readers along the same learning curve he followed, so they ac …

READ MORE

“Fed’s Fisher sees slower U.S. Growth Ahead”

– July 6, 2010

“In the second half of 2010, the U.S. will experience “slower economic growth than we’ve had in the first and second quarter,” Fisher told the Japanese business daily Nikkei. He estimated U.S. growth of 2%-3%, saying that the figure will likely come “c …

READ MORE

“Chicago Fed’s Evans ‘wary’ of more asset purchases”

– June 30, 2010

“”There are limits to what policy can do,” especially to improve the nation’s labor market, Evans said in a television interview on CNBC. Interest rates are near zero as the Federal Reserve’s stuck with an accommodative monetary policy, and it’s alread …

READ MORE

“The Financial Crisis: A Timeline of Events and Policy Actions”

– June 29, 2010

“February 2007 February 27, 2007 | Freddie Mac Press Release The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac) announces that it will no longer buy the most risky subprime mortgages and mortgage-related securities. April 2007 April 2, 2007 | SEC …

READ MORE

“Assessing Winners and Losers in Final Reform Bill”

– June 25, 2010

“Those looking for clear winners and losers after the conference committee struck a historic final agreement early Friday on regulatory reform legislation are bound to be frustrated. For every agency or industry participant that appeared to gain in the …

READ MORE

Reflections on Money

– June 25, 2010

On Thursday, June 17, I attended a lecture by Dr. Benjamin Powell of Suffolk University. He spoke at the Charles G. Koch Foundation, giving one of his excellent lectures on Somalia and its Stateless society. While the lecture itself is well worth heari …

READ MORE

Sound Money Insights from Fed President

– June 24, 2010

Kansas City Fed President Thomas Hoenig is a lone dissenter at the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC)–the central bank’s main policymaking body. At the June FOMC meeting, for the fourth time in a row, he dissented to the Fed’s statement that economi …

READ MORE

“The Fed’s Exit Strategy for Monetary Policy”

– June 24, 2010

“To many observers, the Federal Reserve’s extraordinary policy actions during the recent crisis averted a financial Armageddon and curtailed the depth and duration of the recession (Rudebusch 2009). To combat panic and dislocation in financial markets, …

READ MORE