Bernanki.......your fired.

[Maggot]

They are done with him.

[Cynical Ninja]

Care to expand a little for the uninitiated?

[HairOfTheDog]

They are done with him.

Wait...last I read, Bernanke was likely to be hitting the road next year, before his third term.

Did he get canned today?

[Maggot]

linky

President Barack Obama "essentially fired" Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke in televised remarks this week, former Federal Reserve Governor Laurence Meyer says.

[Maggot]

Care to expand a little for the uninitiated?

He is the Fed reserve chairman that dropped the interest rates to a very low level. My guess is they will get him out before the next guy that goes in has to raise the interest rates back up to I bet 6% before next summer. The next guy will get blamed for it though as the spin factory fires up in the media.

[HairOfTheDog]

Ah, thanks for the linky, Maggot. You tease!

I heard Obama's statements.

Bernanake's not fired, technically. But what Obama said to Charlie Rose was certainly a hard-core invitation to early retirement from the post next year. B's gone when this term expires, no doubt.

Bernanke really should think first before he makes public statements that drastically impact the market.

Hope whoever takes over the role next year is top notch. It's such a critical position, especially now.

[HairOfTheDog]

Janet Yellen will be Obama's nominee to lead the Fed Reserve when Bernanke's term expires in January. She was his third choice (his first choice wasn't interested and his second choice was not supported by the party).



She'll be the first woman in the position; strong qualifications and resume - it's not expected that her nomination will be challenged. She's also currently Bernanke's second in charge.

It's a helluva tough and powerful position. Yellen will be inheriting 6 years of monetary stimulus strategies, suppressed interest rates, high domestic and international debt, etc... Will she continue to advocate for fed intervention in attempt to stimulate job growth (she's been a leader of that strategy) or switch gears to scale back on govt spending?

Hoping the shutdown is over by the time her term starts (kidding, kind of).

Ref:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonk...fed-chair/

[username]

I actually had an interesting discussion with my husband yesterday regarding the Federal Reserve pumping money in to the economy and how it's an independent entity and outside of all this political back and forth on the government closure and the debt ceiling.

So they can just keep printing and pumping, pumping and printing...

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/arch...e3/279810/




I should have known all that but I confess, I didn't. I knew I was in trouble when he said QE3 and I had no idea what he was talking about.

[HairOfTheDog]

I should have known all that but I confess, I didn't. I knew I was in trouble when he said QE3 and I had no idea what he was talking about.

Learn something new everyday; I didn't know what QE3 meant until you referenced it and I looked it up in Investopedia:

"Quantitative easing" refers to steps that the U.S. Federal Reserve takes in attempting to boost the country's lagging economy. Historically, the Fed's main tool for spurring growth has been lowering short-term rates. However, QE employs expansionary monetary policy, which involves the purchasing of bonds when the interest rate can no longer be lowered.

In September of 2012, the Fed announced its third round of quantitative easing, often abbreviated to "QE3." The bank began buying mortgage-backed securities and Treasury bonds in late 2008 to curb mortgage rates and jumpstart the housing market. While many believe the efforts helped stop the economy's downward slide, anemic growth led to a second round of easing in 2010, followed by QE3 in 2012. This iteration involves the Fed buying an additional $40 billion in mortgage-backed securities each month until it sees improvement in the labor market.

The policy is not without its critics. Some economists note that previous easing measures have lowered rates but done relatively little to increase lending. With the Fed buying securities with money that it has essentially created out of thin air, many also believe it leaves the economy vulnerable to out-of-control inflation once the economy fully recovers.

Yellen's gonna have to decide whether to continue with the bond-buying strategy or scale back; been reading about that debate for awhile now.

[Adub]

Care to expand a little for the uninitiated?

He's a Jew.

[HairOfTheDog]

Care to expand a little for the uninitiated?

He's a Jew.

His very savvy Jewish successor, Ms. Yellen, officially takes over for Bernanke on Monday, Feb. 3^rd.

From today's Economic Times report:
Federal Reserve policy makers trimmed bond buying for a second straight meeting, uniting behind a strategy of gradual withdrawal from Ben S Bernanke's unprecedented eaeconomic growth that has "picked up in recent quarters".

It was the first meeting without a dissent since June 2011 showing the tapering strategy has brought together policy makers, who are concerned that the Fed's record $4.1 trillion balance sheet risks causing asset price bubbles, with those who, like Vice Chairman Yellen, say more needs to be done to reduce unemployment.

"As we transition from Bernanke to Yellen, she's in a pretty good place in terms of holding together the centre of the committee," said Stephen Stanley, chief economist for Pierpont Securities in Connecticut.

"It should be relatively easy to hold together a pretty wide consensus." The Fed left unchanged its statement that it will probably hold its target interest rate near zero "well past the time" that unemployment falls below 6.5 per cent, "especially if projected inflation" remains below the committee's longer-run goal of 2 per cent.