Attention Economy


Sunday, September 21, 2014

Global Monetary Policy Developments

Who will raise interest rates first - UK’s BOE or the US Fed?

There is some confusion over the term ‘considerable time’ in recent Fed statements. A piece in the New Yorker notes -
“In other words, Yellen had somehow managed to render the phrase “considerable time” even more vague. The Fed watchers, failed utterly by their thesauruses (synonyms for “considerable” can range from “reasonable” and “respectable” to “huge” and “astronomical”), have generally concluded that an increase remains very likely to take place next year. Further supporting that interpretation, the Fed released an economic-projections document Wednesday showing that fourteen members of the committee felt that 2015 was the appropriate year to raise rates, while one person said that it should happen this year and two people believed that 2016 made the most sense.”

Zhou Xiaochuan – Chinese Central Bank Chief
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-09-19/the-world-s-most-important-central-banker