The Fed is heading for another catastrophe - page 10

 

Williams says Fed yet to decide on lift-off timing Perma bear Williams speaking to AP

  • wants to see more data before deciding on timing of first rate hike
  • mention of the Dec meeting was meant to avert any surprise
  • Really? I mean, it's not as if we have been talking about it for the last 2 years after all

    Jeeze, these guys really do grate huh?

  • Dec FOMC "very much a live meeting"

I doubt if any of them are that "live" at the best of times!

Meanwhile the greenback's treading water but the euro continues to look undermined as EURGBP posts new session lows of 0.7123 leaving GBPUSD at 1.5450 but sending EURUSD down to 1.1020

 

Yellen doesn't see need for negative rates now Fed might consider negative rates if the economy worsened

  • Fed sees the US economy on a steady path
  • If economy deteriorated then negative rates, and other tools, would be on the table
  • Negative rates could encourage banks to lend

That steady path is around 2-3% GDP per year right now

 

The Fed needs to see one thing in Friday's big jobs report: 'further improvement' On Friday morning, the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release the employment report for October.

Among other things, this report will be the first step towards reading how comfortable the Federal Reserve might be with actually raising rates at it December meeting.

Via Bloomberg, here's what Wall Street is expecting:

  • Nonfarm payrolls: +182,000
  • Unemployment rate: 5%
  • Average hourly earnings month-on-month: 0.2%
  • Average hourly earnings year-on-year: 2.3%
  • Average weekly hours worked: 34.5
  • Change in manufacturing payrolls: -4,000

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FED'S WILLIAMS: 'We can’t wait until we see the whites of inflation’s eyes' Now that the United States is closing in on full employment and inflation is likely to rise to target levels, the "next step" should be to start gradually increasing rates, a top U.S. central banker said on Saturday.

"My forecast is that we’ll reach our maximum employment mandate in the near future and I’m increasingly confident that inflation will gradually move back to our 2 percent goal," San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank President John Williams said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Arizona Council on Economic Education. "It makes sense, therefore, to start gradually moving away from the extraordinary stimulus that got us here."

The comments suggest that Williams, a centrist policymaker who was Fed Chair Janet Yellen's chief researcher when she had his job before moving to Washington, is leaning toward support of a December rate hike. The Fed has kept interest rates near zero for almost seven years, and the central bank last month said it would consider a rate increase at its Dec. 15-16 meeting, the last of the year.

Traders boosted their bets on such a move after a government report on Friday showed the economy added many more jobs than expected in October, sending the jobless rate down to 5 percent, close to or at full employment.

A Reuters poll of top bond dealers also showed a growing number expected borrowing costs to go up next month, with 15 of 17 looking for an increase.

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The once unthinkable has finally happened in North Dakota Proof that the shale boom is practically over keeps growing.

Oil production in North Dakota fell year-over-year in September for the first time in 11 years.

A report from Bloomberg's Dan Murtaugh noted that the state's portion of the Bakken formation — a 200,000-square-mile oil region — produced 1.11 million barrels in September, down 1.1% compared to the same period last year.

This drop was preceded by a drawback in drilling activity following the 60% drop in crude oil prices since June 2014.

The slowdown in production is also evident in the collapse of Baker Hughes' weekly oil-rig count, which, in October, was down 15% from a year ago. Oil drillers in North Dakota put down 67% of the rigs in the region, according to Bloomberg.

But with production still robust despite a drilling slowdown in some areas, oil prices are approaching new lows.

On Tuesday morning, West Texas Intermediate crude in New York was down nearly 2%, and dropped to as low as $40.81, after hitting $40.06 on Monday. In August, WTI fell below $40 per barrel for the first time since 2009 amid a glut of supply that simply can't get cleared from the market.

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