Source stringclasses 1
value | Date int64 1.98k 2.01k | Text stringlengths 2 27.1k | Token_count int64 1 5.57k |
|---|---|---|---|
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, I find alternative B generally acceptable, but I like the suggestion that we use 6-3/4 percent as the bottom--or the "midpoint," or whatever you want to call it. It does seem to me that the tops of the ranges there are high for the current circumstances, so I would prefer a directive with lower tops on th... | 111 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Mr. Baughman. Mr. Willes, please. | 16 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you Mr. Chairman. I guess I remain convinced that the best way we have of unraveling the very strong expansion that we have is to fail to deal as aggressively as we can with inflation. Everything inside me says now is a great time to pause. But I am persuaded by Mr. Roos's comment that we are not likely to have a... | 200 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Mr. Willes. Mr. Gardner, please. | 14 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I haven't much to add to all that's been said. I would like to see the ranges brought down a little. I can accept the 1-1/2 to 7-1/2 percent President Volcker suggested and the 5 to 9 percent or even some modest shaving of the top there. But I'm curious about this 6-5/8 to 7-1/8 percent, using fractions [of eight... | 243 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well-- | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | If there is any confusion about what I meant by 6-5/8 to 7-1/8 percent, Mr. Chairman-- | 29 |
fomc | 1,978 | Oh, be careful. | 5 |
fomc | 1,978 | What I mean is Mr. Partee's 6-3/4 to 7 percent. | 20 |
fomc | 1,978 | Gentlemen, I need a little time and I ask you all to relax because the fractions could become so minute, so delicate, so varied. [Pause] Gentlemen, I have a suggestion to make here and please don't question me too closely because if you do, you will find that I have quickly run out of knowledge. The numbers are before ... | 203 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, in my deepest affection for one of the most effective Federal Reserve Chairmen, I won't ask for a recount, but, sir, is there any possibility of shaving that upper limit down a little bit below 8 percent on M1? It would be a shame--you know, I don't want to be a troublemaker at this meeting-- | 72 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well then, let's have a show of hands on the upper limit of 7-1/2 percent. Is that reasonable? I tried to give some recognition to a suggestion made by several members of the Committee that the range be narrowed somewhat. But going from a range of 6 points to 5 points I think would be adequate for one meeting. Let me r... | 156 |
fomc | 1,978 | Could I ask a question? What is the operational interpretation of a strong tendency or strong inclination not to go below 6-3/4 percent? You have made this more important now by lowering the lower end of that M1 range. | 48 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, Mr. Sternlight, you will have to live with that, but why don't you attempt an interpretation of that and if you need help, we'll try to supply it. | 36 |
fomc | 1,978 | Can Mr. Sternlight assume in that interpretation that we leave a phrase about the international situation in the directive? | 22 |
fomc | 1,978 | That definitely ought to be in there. | 8 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I assume that this would mean not moving below 6-3/4 percent--not even considering a move below 6-3/4 percent--unless we were down at the low end of the ranges. And if we were down at that low end, we would want to be in touch with the Committee. | 66 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, that's perhaps a little stronger than I intended. | 11 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes, I like that. | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | Nobody even heard my comment. | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | That's a low end on average. | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Broida, I think is following a suggestion that we use "at about the current level" rather than 6-3/4 percent. All right, since there are no further comments, will the Secretary call the roll, please? | 51 |
fomc | 1,978 | Chairman Burns Yes Vice Chairman Volcker Yes Governor Coldwell Yes Governor Gardner Yes President Guffey Yes Governor Lilly Yes President Mayo Yes President Morris Yes Governor Partee Yes President Roos Yes Governor Wallich Yes Unanimous. | 46 |
fomc | 1,978 | This may be the last--well, it will be the last meeting that I'll be presiding over. I want to say just one word. I don't think I've said it before. I am very pleased that at this last meeting of mine the Committee was unanimous. Thank you very much. | 58 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, if I may have a point of personal privilege, as Vice Chairman of this Committee. I remember when I was first elected. When I arrived here you told me--indeed you announced to the Committee--that the job wasn't going to be very onerous. And I think that prediction, as many others, was borne out. I did get ... | 358 |
fomc | 1,978 | Gentlemen, I'm very grateful to all of you and to you, Paul. You have my warmest thanks and very best wishes for a bright future that you personally and other members deserve. Thank you very much. | 44 |
fomc | 1,978 | Gentlemen, we will start our meeting. I am glad to see all of you once again but I had hoped, as I know all of you did, that this meeting would be chaired by Mr. Miller. He is testifying this morning and he has had his difficulties, but I am reasonably confident that they may be cleared up this morning. We all have our... | 260 |
fomc | 1,978 | I move [that the minutes be] approved. | 10 |
fomc | 1,978 | Second. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | Approval has been moved and seconded. And I take it there is no difficulty. We had a report of the Examination of our System Open Market Account. Is there any desire for discussion of that report? | 41 |
fomc | 1,978 | I move acceptance. | 4 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Balles. | 5 |
fomc | 1,978 | Just a comment, Mr. Chairman. I guess it=s from the Board=s annual report that the press picks up this news--that it looked like a $100 million loss last year in foreign exchange operations. When I had my staff look into this, it turns out that much of that goes back to the middle of 1971 or whatever, but we=re still a... | 193 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I don=t know what we can do about the report, but this question will come up in Congressional hearings and then we ought to make not only the points that you have just made but the additional point that we held onto our gold, and that=s why we got into this loss. Gold then was worth $35 an ounce and, if I remembe... | 83 |
fomc | 1,978 | Right. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | If you take that into account, as you should, and if profits in terms of inflated dollars mean anything, we=ve made an enormous profit. | 30 |
fomc | 1,978 | Good point. It simply came to my attention because Table II of Bill Wallace=s report had a line showing losses from foreign exchange in 1978, and I think the figure was close to $100 million. | 42 |
fomc | 1,978 | Yes, and I have seen figures of this sort cited by distinguished columnists. | 16 |
fomc | 1,978 | Governor Wallich covered that in his testimony recently, Mr. Chairman. | 14 |
fomc | 1,978 | I did refer to this when they complained about the heavy foreign [exchange] losses and I made the point that we retained gold. | 26 |
fomc | 1,978 | While we=re on that subject, we sure are hoarding that gold as if it were there never to be used. Well, we may possibly have further comments on that when we come to item 3 on the agenda, and we=ll be there soon. | 53 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, may I make a comment in light of Mr. Balles=s comment on the losses in the foreign currency transactions? I was going to bring it up [under agenda item 3] but it bears on the System portfolio. The System portfolio is enormously profitable and it is well managed, but there are computations you can make by ... | 230 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, the first figure could be challenged too, but go on. | 14 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, you can say that the average maturity of the portfolio is on the order of 3 years. What has happened to a 3-year note in the market? It has gone down. If the portfolio were to consist all of 3-year notes, which of course it does not, we would have had a loss on the order of $4 billion from this. Again, as I say, ... | 134 |
fomc | 1,978 | I hope that if and when or as this is debated in the Congress, this will never be pointed out because that would only add to the confusion. After all, we could, by pumping reserves into our commercial banks, add enormously to the security holdings of the System and run up our profits to--well, let me say to any conceiv... | 87 |
fomc | 1,978 | Let me just say for the record, Mr. Chairman, if I may, that there was a reference in the examination report to some custody control standards in the acceptance division, which is a fairly small part of the operation. There were some differences of opinion, if that=s the right [term], about the standards that had been ... | 187 |
fomc | 1,978 | Was such an implication intended, Mr. Wallace? | 10 |
fomc | 1,978 | No, Mr. Chairman, it really wasn=t. Conversations between our staff and members of the New York Bank staff indicate that changes are being made to correct the difficulties that we pointed out. I believe Miss Young from our staff, who did this examination, and Mr. Ozog at New York have worked out whatever these differen... | 79 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you very much. Any other comment on the examination report? If not, a motion to accept the report was already [made]; if seconded we can move on. | 35 |
fomc | 1,978 | So moved. | 3 |
fomc | 1,978 | I think that it has been seconded. Again, [I hear] no objections, so we=ll turn now to Mr. Pardee for his report on foreign currency operations. | 37 |
fomc | 1,978 | [Statement--see Appendix.] | 6 |
fomc | 1,978 | Thank you, Mr. Pardee. Are there any questions or comments? | 15 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, this was the first time I was aware that the limitations we place on the Manager are limitations on gross transactions. It seems to me that the procedure has some question marks. The objective of the limitations is to assure the Committee that our net exposure will not exceed a given amount. And it seems ... | 95 |
fomc | 1,978 | I think that=s a fair question. Mr. Wallich. | 13 |
fomc | 1,978 | We have [limitations on] both. The principal one that is stated in the Authorization, which is the basic document, is in terms of the net exposure. And the exposure limits were not overrun. [The Desk] was well within those. What was overrun was the [limit on] gross transactions. The reason for having that is not that i... | 184 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Coldwell. | 5 |
fomc | 1,978 | I think there was another reason too, if I recall correctly, for the establishment of the gross limits--to achieve some balance in the Desk=s operations in foreign currency transactions. [The goal was] that we not be intervening constantly in the market, but intervene with a balanced approach without heavy, massive int... | 77 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Jackson. | 4 |
fomc | 1,978 | To what extent do you try to unwind our position in periods of relative calm? | 16 |
fomc | 1,978 | I=m sorry, but we haven=t had a period of relative calm in which we could really begin to unwind our positions. | 25 |
fomc | 1,978 | I misunderstood. I thought you said there was relative calm for an extended period of-- | 17 |
fomc | 1,978 | That=s right, but it was a very, very tenuous one. During that period, as I say, the same issues that everybody else was worried about were still there. And if we were seen as a buyer of [marks] in that period, we could have had a bigger problem on our hands. We had discussions on several occasions with the Bundesbank ... | 177 |
fomc | 1,978 | Do you perceive our function to be to make a profit [and not] a loss or to counter a disorderly market? | 25 |
fomc | 1,978 | The first function is related to the conditions of the marketplace. And, as I say, we did discuss actively with the Bundesbank this [issue of] when they might pick up some marks for us but the conditions were not right. The second consideration--I=ll say it because it was discussed earlier on--is this question of relat... | 80 |
fomc | 1,978 | As of noon, or whenever it was on Friday, we had picked up quite a few marks. The market was having a rally. Unfortunately, the market turned again during the afternoon, but that was the specific instance when you got up to $85 million, I think. | 55 |
fomc | 1,978 | The two-way approach does provide us with marks. And once the market turns in our favor, then we will be net buyers of marks without the market necessarily paying much attention to it. But if we go into the market flat out and simply start buying ourselves marks, it would be a matter of a day or two before they=ll say,... | 146 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Partee, please. | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I think there are two questions here and they=re really aspects of the same question. The one that was raised by Frank Morris about the Desk exceeding its limit is whether there needs to be an intra-day limit on gross transactions. I think perhaps there does, but I do think as a matter of strategy it is desirable... | 331 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, I think this is a fair question, but one that I think we can postpone until the next meeting when I believe the rules under which we operate are to be reexamined by the Committee. In the meantime, I think we ought to have some discussion, perhaps some studies by our staff and by some interested members of the Com... | 124 |
fomc | 1,978 | So moved. | 3 |
fomc | 1,978 | Seconded. | 3 |
fomc | 1,978 | A motion to ratify has been made and seconded. I hear no objections. We will pass on to Mr. Holmes=s recommendations. | 28 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, in March the System has 17 swap drawings, totaling $541 million, maturing. It seems unlikely, although it=s not completely inconceivable, that we will be able to acquire that amount in the market. I recommend that the Committee approve the rollover of these swaps on maturity for 3 months. In all cases, th... | 87 |
fomc | 1,978 | The recommendation is clear. Is it acceptable to the Committee? | 12 |
fomc | 1,978 | I don=t believe we have an alternative. | 9 |
fomc | 1,978 | We could just pay it back. | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Take it out of your left pocket! | 8 |
fomc | 1,978 | Any objections to Mr. Holmes=s recommendation? I hear none. I take it that it is acceptable to the Committee. Any other recommendations? | 28 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, Mr. Chairman, in April we have a little different situation. We have six swaps totaling about $136 million that will mature. As they mature, they will have been outstanding for 6 months--the maximum called for in our swap arrangement without a special agreement between the Bundesbank and ourselves. I really think... | 181 |
fomc | 1,978 | In the latter case, we need not be lucky; we just do it. | 16 |
fomc | 1,978 | That=s right. I should point out, however, that from an immediate profit and loss point of view, for those people who are interested in that, these swaps are the most expensive drawings that the System could repay. This arises obviously from the fact that the drawings were made at rates of about 43-1/2 to 44 [cents] pe... | 273 |
fomc | 1,978 | But what difference does it make, Alan? If we take a loss on this one, we get a profit on something else. | 26 |
fomc | 1,978 | That=s right in the long run; but in the short run we show a big loss. That doesn=t bother me, but I just want to point out that if we repay those we maximize our book losses. | 43 |
fomc | 1,978 | You say you maximize them. You say that there are many who agree with your judgment [about the dollar]. I=m sure that is right, but there are many more, judging from the behavior of the market, who seem to disagree with your judgment. I think it is that kind of a question. | 61 |
fomc | 1,978 | That=s right. I think we ought to consider it and I have no recommendation right now. We can wait until we get closer to the [time the drawings mature] for a firm recommendation. | 39 |
fomc | 1,978 | Also bearing in mind that profit and loss, while a significant consideration, may well be swamped by other factors such as the extent of our exposure as far as members of the Congress and perhaps the market both are concerned. | 44 |
fomc | 1,978 | Mr. Chairman, another option that the Committee has is that we could request the Bundesbank to routinely roll over the maturing swaps for 3 additional months with a possibility of another renewal. In many ways, this is the very simplest approach that we might follow. It would not, for example, raise the issue of our 50... | 123 |
fomc | 1,978 | You mean go beyond a 6-month period or 9-month period? | 15 |
fomc | 1,978 | That=s right. It is provided for by mutual agreement between two parties in our swap agreement. But it takes a special agreement to do that. Another possibility, and it=s only a possibility, is that other sources of D-marks might become available to the System--should, for example, the Treasury decide to sell SDRs, bor... | 265 |
fomc | 1,978 | If I hear you right, Alan, you are talking about doing some of this negotiation in what--March or April? | 24 |
fomc | 1,978 | I would like to have preliminary talks with the Bundesbank and be clear about exactly how they feel. They know the same possibilities that I listed here. But I would like to be able to feel free to talk to them quite frankly about the possibilities and get their thinking on this. They=re anxious to do that. | 63 |
fomc | 1,978 | I think we have to bear in mind that the Bundesbank has some particular interest in this matter. One is their concern about the expansion of their monetary base and their money supply, which would be triggered if we were to repay by drawing on the Bundesbank. The second concern they have is that they are uneasy about t... | 104 |
fomc | 1,978 | Would the latter come up, particularly with this 2-year thing? | 14 |
fomc | 1,978 | It could; it could indeed. That=s why I think preliminary negotiations or talk about this would be useful. | 22 |
fomc | 1,978 | May I ask a factual question? | 7 |
fomc | 1,978 | Please. | 2 |
fomc | 1,978 | As you acquire marks in your day-to-day trading, are they put into the System=s account or are they used to repay [swaps]? | 29 |
fomc | 1,978 | Well, they would go into the System account until we accumulate enough to make a decent repayment. We wouldn=t do that with every million that we buy. | 31 |
fomc | 1,978 | What would you consider a decent repayment? | 8 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.