Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell performed some “open mouth operations” on Capitol Hill Tuesday.
Powell talked and the markets freaked out.
The mainstream seems more and more convinced that the Federal Reserve can bring inflation back down to 2% without creating any significant problems in the economy. After the February FOMC meeting, Fed chair Jerome Powell even suggested that the economy would avoid dipping into a recession. But in an interview on Fox Business with Liz Claman, Peter Schiff argued that the Fed won’t beat inflation or get a soft landing. He said the looming economic slowdown will fuel the inflation fire.
With the Federal Reserve delivering a smaller 25 basis point rate hike at its February meeting, there is a perception that the central bank is nearing victory in the inflation fight. But as Peter Schiff pointed out during his podcast, Jerome Powell made several statements that indicate he doesn’t really understand inflation. That raises a question. How can the Fed fight what it doesn’t understand?
Do you believe your eyes? Or do you believe your ears? That’s the dilemma you face as you try to make sense of the latest Federal Reserve meeting and Jerome Powell’s messaging. It’s also a question to ask yourself if you’re evaluating the performance of gold over the last year. In this episode of the Friday Gold Wrap podcast, host Mike Maharrey explores this dilemma in both contexts.
Is the Federal Reserve easing off the accelerator on its inflation fight?
The answer depends on whether you believe your eyes or your ears.
The Federal Reserve would like you to think that it is scientifically guiding the economy with carefully calculated monetary policy.
The truth is the Fed is making things up as it goes along.
Last week, CPI data came in cooler than expected but Jerome Powell’s rhetoric remained hot. The Federal Reserve raised rates by 50 basis points and the Fed chair maintained a hawkish tone. Peter talked about the CPI data and the Fed meeting in his podcast. He said the bottom line is the Fed is still completely oblivious to the disaster it has created.
Peter Schiff joined Liz Claman and Andrew Brenner of NatAlliance Securities to talk about the December Federal Reserve meeting and the messaging from Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Peter said investors need to understand that the game has changed. Inflation isn’t going away.
It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day gyrations of the market, pronouncements of certain government or central bank officials, and the most recent data dump. So, it’s important to keep your eye on the ball. In this episode of the Friday Gold Wrap podcast, host Mike Maharrey breaks down the latest inflation data and the Fed meeting with his eye firmly focused on that ball.
As expected, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 50 basis points at the December Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting. That pushed the federal funds rate to 4.5%. The last time rates were this high was in 2007. That’s bad news for an economy addicted to easy money.
While the pace of rate hikes slowed, the messaging coming out of the Fed was substantially the same as the November meeting.
