Wall Street’s main indexes fell on Tuesday, dragged by weakness in tech and other growth stocks, after comments from Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard spooked investors about potential aggressive actions by the central bank to control inflation.The S&P 500 posted 42 new 52-week highs and 6 new lows; the Nasdaq …
Read More »Fed’s Daly: Can start balance sheet reduction as early as May meeting
San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly explained that the labour market is extremely tight while the Fed is on a path to raising interest rates. She added inflation is as harmful as not having a job while many of the imbalances we see are covid-related. Key Quotes:”I don’t expect a …
Read More »Hawkish Fed Drags Gold Lower
Gold has pulled back from earlier highs and is back in the $1920s territory as the US dollar/US yields rally. Fed Vice Chair Brainard was hawkish on balance sheet reduction, sparking the reversal lower.Markets focus now on Wednesday’s FOMC minutes release as gold bears eye a test of recent sub-$1900 …
Read More »How Do Fed Policymakers Define Maximum Employment?
Congress instructs the Federal Reserve to aim for maximum employment and price stability. The Fed has defined price stability as inflation averaging 2%, but maximum employment cannot be explained in such a simple manner.In its monetary policy strategy statement, FOMC has pointed out that he maximum level of employment is …
Read More »US Shares Slip Amid Downside In Tech Names
US equities mostly fell on Thursday, with losses in large-cap tech stocks leading the fall. The S&P 500 was last down about 0.5% and testing the 4700 level, while the Nasdaq 100 index was last down 1.4% and back nuder 15,700. Apple was down nearly 1.0%, Meta (Facebook) was down …
Read More »Brainard: Fed actions will bring inflation down
Fed Vice Chair nominee Lael Brainard, speaking at a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday, said that the Fed’s actions will bring inflation down whilst also allowing the US labour market to make a full recovery. So far in the hearing, Brainard has not been questioned extensively on …
Read More »Fed Speakers See Rate Increases As Early As March
The President and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Mary Daly has stated that the Federal Reserve Bank does not want to get too far ahead on calling a number of rate increases.She explained that they definitely see rate increases as early as March because inflation is …
Read More »S&P 500 Retreats Under 4600 As Fed’s Tightening-Fears Push Selling
The S&P 500 Index has dipped under 4600 and is down by another more than 1.5% as the equity downturn continues. Concerns about Fed’s tightening policy and higher US bond yields continue to be the main driver of the selling. The equity bears have picked up where they left off …
Read More »Hearings for Fed’s Powell, Brainard likely in January
US Senate Banking Committee Chair Sherrod Brown expects to wait until January to hold hearings on President Joe Biden’s nominees to the top two Federal Reserve positions.Biden last month nominated Fed Chair Jerome Powell to a second four-year term as head of the US central bank and picked Fed Governor …
Read More »Biden to Release Oil Reserves to Combat High Gas Prices
The White House announced during a press statement today, Tuesday, that the US President decided to release the strategic oil reserves of the United States of America, estimated at about 50 million barrels, within 3 months, to contribute to calming crude oil prices, especially since oil prices are high and …
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