How Much Inflation Is Bernanke Willing to Accept?

by: David Merkel posted on: February 26, 2008 | about stocks: IPE / TIP

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1) I agree with Caroline Baum; I don’t think that the FOMC is pushing on a string. The monetary aggregates are moving up, and nominal GDP will as well… it just takes time. The yield curve has enough slope to benefit banks that don’t face a lot of credit problems… and the yield curve will steepen further from here, particularly if the expected nadir of Fed funds drops below 2%. Now, will real GDP begin to pick up steam? Not sure, the real question is how much inflation the Fed is willing to accept in the short run as they try to reflate.

2) Now, inflation seems to be rising globally. At this point in the cycle, the FOMC is ahead of almost all major central banks in loosening policy. I think that is baked into the U.S. dollar at present, so unless the FOMC gets even more ahead, the U.S. dollar should tread water here. Eventually inflation elsewhere will get imported into the U.S. It’s just a matter of time. That’s why I like TIPS here; eventually the level of inflation passing through the CPI will be reflected in implied inflation rates.

3) One last point, this one coming via one of our dedicated readers passing on this blurb from David Rosenberg at Merrill Lynch:

A client sent this to us last week

It was a New York Times article by Louis Uchitelle in December 1990 on the housing and credit crunch. In the article, there is a quote that goes like this – “This is different from the experience of the Great Depression, but something related to the 1930’s is beginning to happen”. Guess who it was that said that (answer below).

Answer to question above

“Ben Bernanke, a Princeton University Economist” (and future Fed chairman, but who knew that then?).

My take: it is a very unusual time to have a man as Fed Chairman who is a wonk about the Great Depression. That makes him far more likely to ease. The real question is what the FOMC will do if economic weakness persists, and inflation continues to creep up. I know that they want to save the day, and then remove all policy accommodation, but that’s a pretty difficult trick to achieve. In this scenario, I don’t think the gambit will work; we will likely end up with a higher rate of price inflation.