14 thoughts on “The Administration Campaign to Push Down the Fed Funds Rate: “Computer Says ‘No'””
joseph
In the February Fed meeting Miran dissented, calling for a 50 basis point cut. In the March Fed meeting Miran dissented, calling for a 25 basis point cut.
Is he admitting that his February call was wrong? If he had gotten his 50 point cut in February would he have called for a 25 point increase in March?
No and no.
I sure hope that Powell stays on the board in May when his chairmanship is up. That would mean that in order to install Warsh as chairman, Trump would have to fire Miran to make room on the board.
joseph
Oh, the “February” meeting referred to above was actually at the end of January.
Mactoduck
As of Friday after the market close, odds of a rate cut are likely to fall further.
The 82nd Airborne Division will have arrived in theater, at least in part, by then. Trump has reportedly cancelled public appearances over the weekend; he has set Friday as a deadline and likes to take action when markets are closed globally.
Israel has stepped up its bombing of Iran, particularly of weapons-making sites, which sound like they think they may be running out of time to omb – Schrodinger rides again.
There is considerable speculation as to what we might attack with ground troops, because no ground target makes much sense if we aren’t set on occupying part or all of Iran – which makes no sense.
Macroduck
TACO it is.
Brent up 5.4% despite the felon-in-chief backing down. Seems like that might be because of Ukraine hitting Russian oil infrastructure.
Macroduck
By the way, in addition to the 82nd Airborne, The 75th Rangers and 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit will be in theater by Friday.
Since this informatiin is all available from open sources and in the press, Iran knows these units are on their way, and have a good idea of what they can do. And however badlythis war has been executed from the top, these units are really good at what they do. Sure, we’ll hear stories of things going wrong, but things always go wrong. These peoole are effective.
So, is this a very expensive effort to back Iran down? That seems the best outcome, but it would encourage future efforts to back Iran down through violence. That’s how “chicken” works. And Iran knows about TACO. Iran has assessed the felon-in-chief’s character – inhumane, selfish and cowardly. Friday night, Iran time could be bad.
Brent and WTI both up 4.4% so far today.
joseph
Hey, here’s a new one. Donald Trump has ordered that all new US currency will be printed with his signature on it. This is for real. The new printing plates have already been engraved.
Since the first federal government paper currency was printed in 1861, it has borne the signatures of the Secretary of the Treasury and the US Treasurer. Trump is bumping the US Treasurer and replacing it with his own signature. This is in addition to a new gold coin that the US Mint will issue with Trump’s portrait.
This is Emperor Caligula stuff. The man is mentally ill.
Macroduck
Off topic – The felon-in-chief decided that his poll ratings are more important than Ukraine’s future, and so eased limits on Russia’s oil exports. Ukraine has other ideas. Here’s Reuters:
“Ukraine using strikes on oil facilities to keep pressure on Russia after sanctions eased, Zelenskiy says”
From the article:
“Reuters calculations based on market data showed on Wednesday at least 40% of Russia’s oil export capacity had been halted as a result of the Ukrainian drone attacks, a disputed attack on a major pipeline, and the seizure of tankers.
“The shutdown is the most severe oil supply disruption in the modern history of Russia, the world’s second-largest oil exporter.”
Ukraine has found out it can harm Russia’s export economy in ways that sanctions have not. Now what? Will Ukraine ease up on Russian oil exports at some point? Let’s not forget that Russia has been attacking Ukraine’s electrical grid…not to mention Ukrainian hospitals, schools and civilians…for months and years.
This means India and China, the two big buyers of Russian oil, are facing a further supply disruption. Two wars, two disruptions of energy supply. Will this change China’s calculation to hold hands with Russia? India’s non-aligned perch seems more reasonable in theory, but still leaves a big hole in energy and fertilizer supply.
Ivan
There has been a 4-fold increase in the number of attacks by Ukraine on targets in Russia. This will only get (a lot) worse for Russia. Ukraine has brilliantly focussed on taking out air defense systems. With air defenses reduced it gets a lot easier for there millions of Ukranian drones to hit their targets.
joseph
As the war drags on with undefined objectives, officials in the Pentagon are now referring to Pete Hegseth as “Dumb McNamara”.
(Someone might have to explain the reference to Baffling whose only lesson from that era seems to be dismissing dead children as “collateral damage.”)
joseph
Meanwhile we have Baffling cheering on Hegseth as he “rains death and destruction from the sky” — ostensibly to free the poor oppressed people of Iran.
As the civilian death toll rolls into the thousands, how’s that working out for you, Sport? Not so well for the dead Iranian civilians.
Another phrase from that long forgotten era you might find useful — “We had to destroy the village in order to save it.”
Macroduck
None of what you attribite tobaffling in this comment is anything like what baffling has written here. baffling wrote that uniformed troops were unlikely to have intentionally targeted a school with missiles. You can disagree with that. To attribute either a war-mongering attitude or ignorance of history to baffling because you disagree about the strike on the school is disingenuous. You disagree about the facts, so lets stick to facts.
joseph
The facts are that Baffling referred to the deaths of children as “collateral damage.” Hey, its war — stuff happens, right?
And the facts are that Baffling said “I also know that if you encourage the Iranians to overthrow their government, but do nothing to support them, then instead of 135 school children you will leave another TENS OF THOUSANDS of innocent civilians DEAD, slaughtered.”
So it sure sounds like Baffling is justifying the necessity of the war.
Look, if someone is taking the side of Trump and Hegseth, two of the dumbest and most ignorant people on earth, its not unreasonable to assume that they might also be dumb and ignorant.
Macroduck
There’s a difference between assuming and asserting. There is a differnce between fact and fantasy.
baffling
macroduck is correct, as usual. and i did ask joseph for a credible solution to the slaughter in iran, that eliminates the indiscriminate slaughter without harming another soul. he has not provided an answer.
In the February Fed meeting Miran dissented, calling for a 50 basis point cut. In the March Fed meeting Miran dissented, calling for a 25 basis point cut.
Is he admitting that his February call was wrong? If he had gotten his 50 point cut in February would he have called for a 25 point increase in March?
No and no.
I sure hope that Powell stays on the board in May when his chairmanship is up. That would mean that in order to install Warsh as chairman, Trump would have to fire Miran to make room on the board.
Oh, the “February” meeting referred to above was actually at the end of January.
As of Friday after the market close, odds of a rate cut are likely to fall further.
The 82nd Airborne Division will have arrived in theater, at least in part, by then. Trump has reportedly cancelled public appearances over the weekend; he has set Friday as a deadline and likes to take action when markets are closed globally.
Israel has stepped up its bombing of Iran, particularly of weapons-making sites, which sound like they think they may be running out of time to omb – Schrodinger rides again.
There is considerable speculation as to what we might attack with ground troops, because no ground target makes much sense if we aren’t set on occupying part or all of Iran – which makes no sense.
TACO it is.
Brent up 5.4% despite the felon-in-chief backing down. Seems like that might be because of Ukraine hitting Russian oil infrastructure.
By the way, in addition to the 82nd Airborne, The 75th Rangers and 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit will be in theater by Friday.
Since this informatiin is all available from open sources and in the press, Iran knows these units are on their way, and have a good idea of what they can do. And however badlythis war has been executed from the top, these units are really good at what they do. Sure, we’ll hear stories of things going wrong, but things always go wrong. These peoole are effective.
So, is this a very expensive effort to back Iran down? That seems the best outcome, but it would encourage future efforts to back Iran down through violence. That’s how “chicken” works. And Iran knows about TACO. Iran has assessed the felon-in-chief’s character – inhumane, selfish and cowardly. Friday night, Iran time could be bad.
Brent and WTI both up 4.4% so far today.
Hey, here’s a new one. Donald Trump has ordered that all new US currency will be printed with his signature on it. This is for real. The new printing plates have already been engraved.
Since the first federal government paper currency was printed in 1861, it has borne the signatures of the Secretary of the Treasury and the US Treasurer. Trump is bumping the US Treasurer and replacing it with his own signature. This is in addition to a new gold coin that the US Mint will issue with Trump’s portrait.
This is Emperor Caligula stuff. The man is mentally ill.
Off topic – The felon-in-chief decided that his poll ratings are more important than Ukraine’s future, and so eased limits on Russia’s oil exports. Ukraine has other ideas. Here’s Reuters:
“Ukraine using strikes on oil facilities to keep pressure on Russia after sanctions eased, Zelenskiy says”
From the article:
“Reuters calculations based on market data showed on Wednesday at least 40% of Russia’s oil export capacity had been halted as a result of the Ukrainian drone attacks, a disputed attack on a major pipeline, and the seizure of tankers.
“The shutdown is the most severe oil supply disruption in the modern history of Russia, the world’s second-largest oil exporter.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/ukraine-using-strikes-on-oil-facilities-to-keep-pressure-on-russia-after-sanctions-eased-zelenskiy-says/ar-AA1ZtOCN
Ukraine has found out it can harm Russia’s export economy in ways that sanctions have not. Now what? Will Ukraine ease up on Russian oil exports at some point? Let’s not forget that Russia has been attacking Ukraine’s electrical grid…not to mention Ukrainian hospitals, schools and civilians…for months and years.
This means India and China, the two big buyers of Russian oil, are facing a further supply disruption. Two wars, two disruptions of energy supply. Will this change China’s calculation to hold hands with Russia? India’s non-aligned perch seems more reasonable in theory, but still leaves a big hole in energy and fertilizer supply.
There has been a 4-fold increase in the number of attacks by Ukraine on targets in Russia. This will only get (a lot) worse for Russia. Ukraine has brilliantly focussed on taking out air defense systems. With air defenses reduced it gets a lot easier for there millions of Ukranian drones to hit their targets.
As the war drags on with undefined objectives, officials in the Pentagon are now referring to Pete Hegseth as “Dumb McNamara”.
(Someone might have to explain the reference to Baffling whose only lesson from that era seems to be dismissing dead children as “collateral damage.”)
Meanwhile we have Baffling cheering on Hegseth as he “rains death and destruction from the sky” — ostensibly to free the poor oppressed people of Iran.
As the civilian death toll rolls into the thousands, how’s that working out for you, Sport? Not so well for the dead Iranian civilians.
Another phrase from that long forgotten era you might find useful — “We had to destroy the village in order to save it.”
None of what you attribite tobaffling in this comment is anything like what baffling has written here. baffling wrote that uniformed troops were unlikely to have intentionally targeted a school with missiles. You can disagree with that. To attribute either a war-mongering attitude or ignorance of history to baffling because you disagree about the strike on the school is disingenuous. You disagree about the facts, so lets stick to facts.
The facts are that Baffling referred to the deaths of children as “collateral damage.” Hey, its war — stuff happens, right?
And the facts are that Baffling said “I also know that if you encourage the Iranians to overthrow their government, but do nothing to support them, then instead of 135 school children you will leave another TENS OF THOUSANDS of innocent civilians DEAD, slaughtered.”
So it sure sounds like Baffling is justifying the necessity of the war.
Look, if someone is taking the side of Trump and Hegseth, two of the dumbest and most ignorant people on earth, its not unreasonable to assume that they might also be dumb and ignorant.
There’s a difference between assuming and asserting. There is a differnce between fact and fantasy.
macroduck is correct, as usual. and i did ask joseph for a credible solution to the slaughter in iran, that eliminates the indiscriminate slaughter without harming another soul. he has not provided an answer.