Fed Divided Over When to End Stimulus
WASHINGTON — Federal Reserve policymakers are divided over when to end extraordinary measures intended to encourage more borrowing and spending to help stimulate the U.S. economy, according to minutes of the Fed’s last meeting released Wednesday. The minutes of the Fed’s March 19-20 meeting were released at 9 a.m. EDT — five hours earlier than planned — after the Fed inadvertently sent them a day earlier to congressional staffers and lobbyists. The report showed that a few members want to end “relatively soon” a program that is spending $85 billion a month to purchases bonds. Those members say the costs likely outweigh the benefits. A few others saw the risks as increasing quickly and said the purchases would likely need to be reduced “before long.” Many members said an improved job market could lead them to slow purchases within a few months, and a few said economic conditions would likely justify continuing the program until late this year. (MORE: Obama’s Budget Would ...
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Fed Says It Will Sstick with Aggressive Stimulus
WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve on Wednesday stood by its efforts to keep borrowing costs at record lows, saying it isn’t yet convinced that the U.S. economy’s growth can accelerate without significant help from the central bank. It wants to see sustained improvement. Fed officials reinforced their plan to keep short-term interest rates at rock-bottom levels at least until unemployment falls to 6.5 percent. An unemployment rate of 6.5 percent is a threshold, not a “trigger,” for a possible rate increase, Chairman Ben Bernanke said. “We are seeing improvement,” he said. “One thing we would need is to see this is not temporary improvement.” The Fed will continue buying $85 billion a month in bonds indefinitely to keep long-term borrowing costs down. Bernanke said the Fed might vary the size of its monthly purchases depending on whether the job market improves and by how much. (MORE: What Happens When the Fed Really Does Run Out of Ammunition?) The unemployment rate has ...
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Fed to change timing of policy statement
WASHINGTON -- The Federal Reserve is changing its schedule for issuing policy statements, a shift that will give Chairman Ben Bernanke more control over how investors respond to the Fed's decisions....
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Greenspan Writes of Forecasting Perils
Former Fed chief Alan Greenspan's new book, a look at economic decision making titled "The Map and the Territory: Risk, Human Nature and the Future of the World Economy," will be published by Penguin Press on Oct. 22.
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Asian shares gain on global recovery outlook, eyes Fed
TOKYO - Asian shares rose to their highest level in nearly 18 months on Wednesday as strong U.S. data further boosted investor confidence in global economic outlook, ahead of the U.S. Federal Reserve's monetary policy decision due later in the session.
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Reuters