FED’S ROSENGREN: ‘NO BIAS’ TOWARD EASING, TIGHTENING
–Would Not Rule Out Altering Normalization By Anthony Mace BOSTON (MaceNews) – Fed policy-makers must pay attention to the gloomy message coming from financial markets, but underlying fundamentals point to better economic prospects, Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren said Wednesday. For now, there is “no bias toward tightening or easing,” and policy-makers will focus on […]
FED’S POWELL SAYS STRONG JOBS NOT NECESSARILY INFLATIONARY
–Says Wouldn’t Resign if Trump Asked, But Would Meet –‘We Will Be Patient’ as Economy Evolves By Denny Gulino ATLANTA (MaceNews) – Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell Friday reassured the markets that a strong jobs market, like that reflected in the morning’s 312,000 new payroll slots reported for December, is not inflationary – and that […]
SOMBER DEBT WARNINGS AS GOP CEDES CONTROL OF HOUSE
–Democracy Tested by Impending Debt Doom By Denny Gulino CAPITOL HILL (MaceNews) – “The outlook is dire and will have consequences,” Douglas Holtz-Eakin told the House Financial Services Committee, one of many warnings heard Thursday about the nation’s unsustainable burden of debt and interest payments.. Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, was one of […]
FOMC HIKES, SEES ‘SOME’ FUTURE HIKES
WASHINGTON (MaceNews) – The Federal Open Market Committee Wednesday fulfilled expectations for its fourth rate hike of the year, to a range topping out at 2.5% for federal funds, and only slightly eased its outlook to “some” more gradual increases, disappointing those looking for more dovish signals. The statement still saw economic activity “rising at […]
EXCLUSIVE: PELOSI CONFIRMS, NO GOVT SHUTDOWN
By Denny Gulino CAPITOL HILL (MaceNews) – The presumed next Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi Wednesday told Mace News there will be no government shutdown midnight Friday, that the House Thursday will OK the continuing resolution to keep the government open until at least February 8. “No,” she said to the question, “Will there […]
WAITING FOR TWEET CANCELLING US GOVT SHUTDOWN
By Denny Gulino CAPITOL HILL (MaceNews) – Amid the mostly empty hallways on Capitol Hill, a growing expectation Tuesday afternoon that the White House will soon signal the government shutdown threatened for Friday midnight won’t happen after all. Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters at the White House in the regular afternoon news briefing that while […]
US MONTHLY DEFICIT FOR NOVEMBER EXAGGERATED
WASHINGTON (MaceNews) – For deficit hawks, November looked like the perfect example of how the government’s red ink is now spreading faster but although that is expected to happen relatively soon, the acceleration this time is exaggerated. The official deficit number is $205 billion, which would be a giant leap from last year’s November, 48%. […]
ECB: TO INVEST QE PROCEEDS BEYOND RATE RISE
By Laurie Laird FRANKFURT (MaceNews) – The European Central Bank Thursday confirmed its intention to end quantitative easing at year end, despite marked signs of weakness in the euro zone economy, but stressed a commitment to reinvesting proceeds of previous bond purchases over the medium term or longer. We intend to continue to reinvesting, in […]
US CPI AS USUAL EX-GAS; INFL SIGNALS INCONCLUSIVE
WASHINGTON (MaceNews) – Transitory noise from plummeting gasoline prices overwhelmed the broadly moderate gains in November’s Consumer Price Index report Wednesday and promises to do the same in the current month. The “all items” index was unchanged after going up 0.3% in October but the core reading without energy and food was up 0.2% in […]
US JOBS GROWTH MODERATES IN NOV; 155K PAYROLLS
WASHINGTON (MaceNews) – The November jobs report’s tally of 155,000 new payroll slots Friday was positive news on balance, with 27,000 new manufacturing jobs, despite coming in below expectations. With its moderate but overall broad-based improvement, the latest jobs report seemed to have little scenario-changing import for monetary policy. Wage growth stayed above an annual […]