por admin » Mar Oct 12, 2010 1:18 pm
El Fed va a actuar
ECONOMYOCTOBER 12, 2010, 2:14 P.M. ET
Fed Suggests Action Is Needed
By LUCA DI LEO And JEFFREY SPARSHOTT
Barring surprising improvements in the economy, most U.S. Federal Reserve officials believed new steps would be needed to jump-start growth when they last met Sept. 21.
Fed officials' discussions focused on buying more U.S. Treasurys or new strategies for inflation if prices remained too low and unemployment too high, minutes of their last meeting, released with the usual lag on Tuesday, showed.
"Meeting participants discussed several possible approaches to providing additional accommodation but focused primarily on further purchases of longer-term Treasury securities and on possible steps to affect inflation expectations," the minutes showed.
The minutes also revealed that the Fed's staff cut the projections for economic growth in 2011 and expected the underlying inflation rate -- already below the central bank's informal objective -- to slow further next year.
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Associated Press
The Federal Reserve Building on Constitution Avenue in Washington.
Because of the economy's weakness, inflation is currently running below the Fed's informal target of between 1.7% and 2.0%. The central bank's most closely-watched indicator put underlying inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, at only 1.4% in August.
Fed officials discussed several ways they could affect short-term inflation expectations, including providing more detailed information about the rates of inflation considered consistent with its dual mandate of stable prices and full employment.
"Targeting a path for the price level rather than the rate of inflation" was one of the strategies that was considered by officials, the minutes showed.
Some Fed officials have suggested the central bank may have to do more than buy U.S. Treasury bonds to help the economy, such as declaring it wants inflation to temporarily rise above its informal target of around 2.0%.
New York Fed President William Dudley has recently raised the possibility the Fed may allow inflation to run over target for some time to offset a price level that's been running below its objective.
Chicago Fed President Charles Evans, meantime, told the Wall Street Journal in an interview last week that he's worried the bond purchases may not be enough to address his concerns about low inflation and high unemployment.
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his new deputy, Janet Yellen, have spoken against raising the Fed's inflation target earlier this year, when the debate arose among top international economists.
However, Mr. Bernanke did recommend such an approach for Japan in 1999, when he was economics professor at Princeton. To fight the threat of a debilitating bout of deflation, when wages and prices fall on the back of the economy's weakness, Mr. Bernanke suggested Japan introduce an inflation target of between 3.0% to 4.0%.
Moreover, a price-level target would be different, allowing the Fed to make up for when inflation undershoots its target, as it is now, by overshooting it later. That would help raise short-term inflation expectations, which are currently subdued.
Last week, Ben Bernanke said he believes further asset purchases by the central bank could help the economy, signaling the Fed is likely to make such a move if the outlook remains weak. Since then, a report has shown the jobs market remained weak in September, with the unemployment rate stuck close to 10%.