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fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. President Fisher. | 6 |
fomc | 2,007 | Mr. Chairman, I don't think I could have said it better than Governor Kohn said it. I am on his wavelength. I would just add a couple of things that I would suggest we consider. First of all, with regard to the financial situation, which is obviously driving this conversation, I appreciate the medical pathology that th... | 702 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. President Evans. | 6 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I favor a 1/4 point reduction in the fed funds rate today. As I noted earlier, assuming some ease in policy, my forecast is that the economy will experience subpar growth stretching into the middle of 2008 but then recover as we move into 2009 and that inflation will remain contained. Our forec... | 682 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. President Pianalto. | 7 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I favor a 25 basis point cut in our fed funds rate target and the language in alternative B. More losses at financial companies, in combination with uncertain year-end funding pressures, obviously have unsettled financial markets again. As I said earlier, sentiment about business conditions nex... | 298 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. Governor Warsh. | 7 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I support alternative B as is. Without monetary policy action, it does strike me that the harm to the real economy could be larger and longer than otherwise. Similarly, I would say that without employing the liquidity tools that we discussed when we met by videoconference, monetary policy may w... | 415 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. Governor Kroszner. | 9 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you very much. I think we have two fronts on which we have to work--both the macro risks, in particular the housing risks and the liquidity issues, and their interaction, as a lot of people have discussed. So I favor a 25 basis point reduction with the other actions that we will be taking with respect to liquidit... | 487 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. Governor Mishkin. | 7 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The modal forecast suggests a cut of at least 25 basis points. In fact, it indicates that we need to have further declines after that. As Governor Kohn pointed out, the 25 basis point cut still leaves us as somewhat restrictive. So we could just sit at a 25 basis point cut and not move further ... | 1,573 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Oh, sorry. Vice Chairman. [Laughter] | 19 |
fomc | 2,007 | I support the reduction in the fed funds rate of 25 basis points and the language in alternative B for almost all the reasons that were raised around the table. I just want to say two quick things. One is that, if we start acting as though we are constrained by the political calendar of this country and choose to shade... | 302 |
fomc | 2,007 | Thank you. Well, again, thank you, thank you all. I do think we need to move today. Once we take into account the drag from financial conditions, arguably the current rate is neutral or even somewhat restrictive. For example, the Taylor rules in the Bluebook have the neutral rate between 4 and 41/4 percent. Moreover, t... | 676 |
fomc | 2,007 | The vote today encompasses the directive from the Bluebook and the language of alternative B that was in the Bluebook and in the handout. The directive reads as follows: "The Federal Open Market Committee seeks monetary and financial conditions that will foster price stability and promote sustainable growth in output. ... | 137 |
fomc | 2,007 | Okay. Thank you. We need to recess briefly here for the discount rate. | 16 |
fomc | 2,007 | Okay. Why don't we reconvene. Again, thank you all. Let me just reiterate what I was saying about the statement. I hope as we go through the intermeeting period that we will try to maintain our flexibility. As we discuss the outlook in public, we should of course give our honest and full views on the outlook and the ri... | 539 |
fomc | 2,007 | Mr. Chairman, may I make one point about January, which, as you are all aware, is that I don't think any of us--and it is really not the staff--will be in a position in January to provide a definitive set of convictions about really what worked, what didn't work, what really contributed to it, and what we did to the in... | 156 |
fomc | 2,007 | I think it will be very interesting. President Yellen. | 12 |
fomc | 2,007 | I just have a question. With respect to the implementation of the TAF, could you clarify what we need to ask our boards of directors to do and when? | 33 |
fomc | 2,007 | Can I get some help? Scott. | 8 |
fomc | 2,007 | I circulated to the general counsels yesterday resolutions that could be presented to the boards of directors that adopt the result of the auction as the recommendation by the Reserve Bank for the discount rate on the TAF. The Board would then be accepting those and voting on them. | 53 |
fomc | 2,007 | Do we have those? We have a meeting on Thursday morning. | 13 |
fomc | 2,007 | Yes. The resolutions have all been circulated to all of the general counsels of the Reserve Banks, so they should have them and could be presenting them. | 31 |
fomc | 2,007 | But you are not circulating them to us? | 9 |
fomc | 2,007 | I could give them to you. | 7 |
fomc | 2,007 | That would be nice. [Laughter] | 9 |
fomc | 2,007 | It is less for you to carry home. | 9 |
fomc | 2,007 | But general counsels normally don't participate in this process. | 11 |
fomc | 2,007 | He is not speaking to you? [Laughter] | 11 |
fomc | 2,007 | No, he didn't speak to me. | 8 |
fomc | 2,007 | I can send a copy to all the Presidents. | 10 |
fomc | 2,007 | All right. President Fisher. | 6 |
fomc | 2,007 | Mr. Chairman, I just want to make sure that I heard you clearly earlier. We have kept this contained, including the swap ranges, which is very impressive. Everybody should pat themselves on the back. [Laughter] We're broadening the circle tonight or this afternoon, and I'm not quite sure what your message is. I assume ... | 135 |
fomc | 2,007 | We were asked whether it was okay to inform the boards. Given that the boards are often privy to confidential information, I didn't see any reason to prohibit that. I think in some cases it might be a useful compromise, instead, just to inform your chairman. But we are not requesting that you inform your board. It is u... | 120 |
fomc | 2,007 | I just wanted to make sure there wasn't a subtext to the message, but I've got it. Thank you. | 23 |
fomc | 2,007 | President Plosser. | 5 |
fomc | 2,007 | Just to clarify what our boards have to approve, as I understand, it is the willingness to accept the rate that comes out of the auction at the discount window. | 33 |
fomc | 2,007 | For the loans made at the facility. | 8 |
fomc | 2,007 | The discount window will still exist. They will still be making loans at 50 basis points above the fed funds rate. This is a new facility, approved by the Board. What your board has to approve is the willingness to make loans from your discount window at the rate determined by the auction. | 59 |
fomc | 2,007 | That is what I understood. Okay. | 8 |
fomc | 2,007 | One clarifying thing, and just a question for Scott. Is it okay from your perspective if the recommendations come from boards of directors after the announcement, so long as they come before the first auction? So Thursday would be fine? | 46 |
fomc | 2,007 | They just have to be here by December 17. | 11 |
fomc | 2,007 | All right. The meeting is adjourned. | 10 |
fomc | 2,008 | Good afternoon, everybody. Today is the last meeting for our friend and colleague, Bill Poole. Bill has been here for 81 meetings, 80 as a Reserve Bank president and one as an adviser to the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. I thought I would read to you the transcript from March 31, 1998, when Bill first joined the tabl... | 199 |
fomc | 2,008 | Thanks, Mr. Chairman. I came here 10 years ago with a boom. I'm going out with a pause. [Laughter] | 28 |
fomc | 2,008 | We'll let Bill have the last word on that. [Laughter] Okay. Today is the first regular meeting of the year. This is our organizational meeting, so we have some housekeeping things. Item one, nomination of the Chairman. Governor Kohn. | 51 |
fomc | 2,008 | It's an honor and a privilege to nominate Ben Bernanke to be the Chairman of this Committee. | 19 |
fomc | 2,008 | Thank you. Second? SEVERAL. Second. | 11 |
fomc | 2,008 | A pregnant pause. | 4 |
fomc | 2,008 | Other nominations? Without objection, thank you very much. We need a nomination for Vice Chairman. | 19 |
fomc | 2,008 | I can do that, too. It's another honor and a privilege to nominate Tim Geithner to be the Vice Chairman of this Committee. | 28 |
fomc | 2,008 | Second? | 2 |
fomc | 2,008 | Second. | 2 |
fomc | 2,008 | Other nominations? Without objection. Thank you. Ms. Danker will read the nominated staff officers for the Committee. | 23 |
fomc | 2,008 | Secretary and Economist, Brian Madigan; Deputy Secretary, Deborah Danker; Assistant Secretaries, David Skidmore and Michelle Smith; General Counsel, Scott Alvarez; Deputy General Counsel, Thomas Baxter; Assistant General Counsel, Richard Ashton; Economists, Nathan Sheets and David Stockton; Associate Economists from th... | 112 |
fomc | 2,008 | Any questions? We'll need a vote. All in favor? [Chorus of ayes] Opposed? [No response] Thank you. Item two on the agenda: There are some cosmetic changes to the Committee rules. Scott Alvarez and Debbie Danker circulated a memorandum. Are there any questions? If not, I'll need a vote in favor. [Chorus of ayes] Opposed... | 336 |
fomc | 2,008 | 1 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll be referring to the handout that you should have in front of you. Over the past month, term funding pressures for banks have generally subsided. But the bigger story remains the continued pressure on bank balance sheets, the tightening of credit availability, and the impact of this tight... | 2,946 |
fomc | 2,008 | Thank you, Bill. Are there questions? President Poole. | 13 |
fomc | 2,008 | Bill, could you talk about the role of foreign banking organizations? What fraction roughly are they responsible for? | 21 |
fomc | 2,008 | We have been very cautious about talking about the role of the foreign banks, but they're definitely a significant factor. The best way to look at it is just to look at the New York District, which is taking an overwhelming share of not all but most of these auctions, and most of that is foreign. Regarding the particip... | 117 |
fomc | 2,008 | If I may make a comment about that--I think everyone is aware of my view that the TAF does not change the marginal conditions. It's entirely an inframarginal operation. What it does is to save banks the spread between what their cost of funds otherwise would be and what they get at the TAF. So it increases bank earning... | 150 |
fomc | 2,008 | President Lacker. | 4 |
fomc | 2,008 | Yes, I have a couple of questions. I want to start with the issue about foreign banks, though. Why are we sensitive about talking about foreign banks--I mean, is this a public stance, or is this in the Committee? The information about the identity of the winning bidders was sent to every Reserve Bank. | 64 |
fomc | 2,008 | I don't think we're particularly sensitive, but I think other central banks would be very sensitive. | 18 |
fomc | 2,008 | Well, these are confidential proceedings--this is a consequential policy matter. | 14 |
fomc | 2,008 | Brian. | 2 |
fomc | 2,008 | Mr. Chairman, if I could. I think, President Lacker, just one point is that the detailed information on the bidders was sent only to those Reserve Bank presidents and Board members who specifically asked for it, so it was not distributed unilaterally. | 53 |
fomc | 2,008 | Just the winning bidders? | 5 |
fomc | 2,008 | Yes. Well, the spreadsheet of bidders. | 9 |
fomc | 2,008 | I thought that every Bank, all the discount officers, received the identity of the winning bidders, and the other information about all the bids went only to those who requested it. | 35 |
fomc | 2,008 | That is correct, yes. The second point I would make is that I do not think there is particular sensitivity about foreign banks but instead sensitivity about taking any chance of identifying who the bidders are at all because of the great concern about avoiding stigma from the TAF. | 53 |
fomc | 2,008 | I wanted to ask a couple of questions about the term auction facility. First, I'd like to hear more from you about what your understanding is of the effects the term auction facility had on the funding market. The first question under that would be, To your knowledge, were these completely sterilized or just partially ... | 388 |
fomc | 2,008 | Those are a lot of questions. [Laughter] Okay, I'll take the easy one first. The TAF is completely sterilized. For every dollar that goes into the TAF we drain reserves, and we've been doing that mainly by redeeming maturing Treasury bills. Regarding whether these are additional funds to those entities, it is hard to k... | 486 |
fomc | 2,008 | If I could just follow up. | 7 |
fomc | 2,008 | Did I miss any? | 5 |
fomc | 2,008 | Well, on the last point, that's a matter of the ECB's willingness to lend to those institutions. You're saying that they would be willing to lend themselves to those institutions only if we did this. It's not about the economics of their borrowing from their central bank versus borrowing from us--nothing about the mark... | 63 |
fomc | 2,008 | I wouldn't say it's about their willingness to lend to their institutions. It's their sense of what their responsibility is in terms of providing dollar liquidity to their institutions. To the extent that they could just passively take the dollars and funnel them through this auction process in which their auction was ... | 112 |
fomc | 2,008 | Do market participants view foreign banking organizations as broadly riskier than comparable-sized institutions based in the United States? | 21 |
fomc | 2,008 | Well, it's difficult to say. If you look at credit default swaps, that would say not. But as President Rosengren and I were talking before the meeting, those credit default swaps may also contain different appetites to recapitalize banks when they get in trouble in the United States versus abroad. So the one thing that... | 142 |
fomc | 2,008 | May I add one factual comment to that? | 9 |
fomc | 2,008 | Absolutely. | 2 |
fomc | 2,008 | During the height of the dislocations in December, the fed funds rate overnight was regularly trading substantially higher early in the morning--this happened also in August for a while--either early in the U.S. trading session or before that. Our understanding from market participants was that the reason for those hig... | 104 |
fomc | 2,008 | Thanks. Going back to the LIBOR-OIS spread--that was what motivated this. It has fallen a lot. The bid-to-cover ratio is falling. If we try to lend $30 billion three more times, we could get to a point at which we satiate the market in term funds. | 61 |
fomc | 2,008 | Well, first of all, continuing that $30 billion is not supplying any additional dollars, so we're just going to be rolling over maturing auctions. | 30 |
fomc | 2,008 | Yes, but the bid-to-cover ratio keeps falling. | 11 |
fomc | 2,008 | Right. But, second, I would caution you that this last auction was right before an FOMC meeting and that may have diminished the appetite. We don't know with certainty, but our supposition is that the demand would have been higher if the auction had been a week later, if that's how the schedule had fallen. Third, Febru... | 161 |
fomc | 2,008 | President Fisher. | 3 |
fomc | 2,008 | The questions that President Lacker asked covered one of the questions I wanted to ask. But as we go down in terms of the number of bidders as we proceed, is the portion that is foreign increasing, relatively speaking? Do we know? | 48 |
fomc | 2,008 | I don't remember any strong sense of that. | 9 |
fomc | 2,008 | It's decreasing. | 3 |
fomc | 2,008 | What has happened, as the auction has proceeded, is that people have bid more tightly around where they think it's going to come, except for a few institutions who just say, "I want the money," and they bid at very high rates because it's a single price auction. You usually see some behavior like that. | 63 |
fomc | 2,008 | Mr. Chairman. | 4 |
fomc | 2,008 | Yes. | 2 |
fomc | 2,008 | Foreign banks were $19 billion out of $20 billion at the first auction; $18 billion out of $20 billion at the second auction; and a declining fraction thereafter, President Fisher. | 38 |
fomc | 2,008 | Thank you, President Lacker. | 7 |
fomc | 2,008 | President Lockhart. | 4 |
fomc | 2,008 | Bill, in your remarks, you devoted quite a bit of time to the deteriorating situation in the monolines, the implication being that the risks they may have affect the whole system. In the normal course, do we have direct contact with them to get any insight beyond what we get through analysts and rating agencies? I thin... | 107 |
fomc | 2,008 | I haven't had much contact with them. I don't know if Tim has. | 15 |
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