Bernanke update: Jan 13th (London School of Business)

Speech
Chairman Ben S. Bernanke
At the Stamp Lecture, London School of Economics, London, England
January 13, 2009

The Crisis and the Policy Response

For almost a year and a half the global financial system has been under extraordinary stress--stress that has now decisively spilled over to the global economy more broadly. The proximate cause of the crisis was the turn of the housing cycle in the United States and the associated rise in delinquencies on subprime mortgages, which imposed substantial losses on many financial institutions and shook investor confidence in credit markets. However, although the subprime debacle triggered the crisis, the developments in the U.S. mortgage market were only one aspect of a much larger and more encompassing credit boom whose impact transcended the mortgage market to affect many other forms of credit. Aspects of this broader credit boom included widespread declines in underwriting standards, breakdowns in lending oversight by investors and rating agencies, increased reliance on complex and opaque credit instruments that proved fragile under stress, and unusually low compensation for risk-taking.

The abrupt end of the credit boom has had widespread financial and economic ramifications. Financial institutions have seen their capital depleted by losses and writedowns and their balance sheets clogged by complex credit products and other illiquid assets of uncertain value. Rising credit risks and intense risk aversion have pushed credit spreads to unprecedented levels, and markets for securitized assets, except for mortgage securities with government guarantees, have shut down. Heightened systemic risks, falling asset values, and tightening credit have in turn taken a heavy toll on business and consumer confidence and precipitated a sharp slowing in global economic activity. The damage, in terms of lost output, lost jobs, and lost wealth, is already substantial.

The global economy will recover, but the timing and strength of the recovery are highly uncertain. Government policy responses around the world will be critical determinants of the speed and vigor of the recovery. Today I will offer some thoughts on current and prospective policy responses to the crisis in the United States, with a particular emphasis on actions by the Federal Reserve. In doing so, I will outline the framework that has guided the Federal Reserve's responses to date. I will also explain why I believe that the Fed still has powerful tools at its disposal to fight the financial crisis and the economic downturn, even though the overnight federal funds rate cannot be reduced meaningfully further.

The Federal Reserve's Response to the Crisis

The Federal Reserve has responded aggressively to the crisis since its emergence in the summer of 2007. Following a cut in the discount rate (the rate at which the Federal Reserve lends to depository institutions) in August of that year, the Federal Open Market Committee began to ease monetary policy in September 2007, reducing the target for the federal funds rate by 50 basis points.1 As indications of economic weakness proliferated, the Committee continued to respond, bringing down its target for the federal funds rate by a cumulative 325 basis points by the spring of 2008. In historical comparison, this policy response stands out as exceptionally rapid and proactive. In taking these actions, we aimed both to cushion the direct effects of the financial turbulence on the economy and to reduce the virulence of the so-called adverse feedback loop, in which economic weakness and financial stress become mutually reinforcing.

These policy actions helped to support employment and incomes during the first year of the crisis. Unfortunately, the intensification of the financial turbulence last fall led to further deterioration in the economic outlook. The Committee responded by cutting the target for the federal funds rate an additional 100 basis points last October, with half of that reduction coming as part of an unprecedented coordinated interest rate cut by six major central banks on October 8. In December the Committee reduced its target further, setting a range of 0 to 25 basis points for the target federal funds rate.

The Committee's aggressive monetary easing was not without risks. During the early phase of rate reductions, some observers expressed concern that these policy actions would stoke inflation. These concerns intensified as inflation reached high levels in mid-2008, mostly reflecting a surge in the prices of oil and other commodities. The Committee takes its responsibility to ensure price stability extremely seriously, and throughout this period it remained closely attuned to developments in inflation and inflation expectations. However, the Committee also maintained the view that the rapid rise in commodity prices in 2008 primarily reflected sharply increased demand for raw materials in emerging market economies, in combination with constraints on the supply of these materials, rather than general inflationary pressures. Committee members expected that, at some point, global economic growth would moderate, resulting in slower increases in the demand for commodities and a leveling out in their prices--as reflected, for example, in the pattern of futures market prices. As you know, commodity prices peaked during the summer and, rather than leveling out, have actually fallen dramatically with the weakening in global economic activity. As a consequence, overall inflation has already declined significantly and appears likely to moderate further.

The Fed's monetary easing has been reflected in significant declines in a number of lending rates, especially shorter-term rates, thus offsetting to some degree the effects of the financial turmoil on financial conditions. However, that offset has been incomplete, as widening credit spreads, more restrictive lending standards, and credit market dysfunction have worked against the monetary easing and led to tighter financial conditions overall. In particular, many traditional funding sources for financial institutions and markets have dried up, and banks and other lenders have found their ability to securitize mortgages, auto loans, credit card receivables, student loans, and other forms of credit greatly curtailed. Thus, in addition to easing monetary policy, the Federal Reserve has worked to support the functioning of credit markets and to reduce financial strains by providing liquidity to the private sector. In doing so, as I will discuss shortly, the Fed has deployed a number of additional policy tools, some of which were previously in our toolkit and some of which have been created as the need arose.

Beyond the Federal Funds Rate: The Fed's Policy Toolkit

Although the federal funds rate is now close to zero, the Federal Reserve retains a number of policy tools that can be deployed against the crisis.

One important tool is policy communication. Even if the overnight rate is close to zero, the Committee should be able to influence longer-term interest rates by informing the public's expectations about the future course of monetary policy. To illustrate, in its statement after its December meeting, the Committee expressed the view that economic conditions are likely to warrant an unusually low federal funds rate for some time.2 To the extent that such statements cause the public to lengthen the horizon over which they expect short-term rates to be held at very low levels, they will exert downward pressure on longer-term rates, stimulating aggregate demand. It is important, however, that statements of this sort be expressed in conditional fashion--that is, that they link policy expectations to the evolving economic outlook. If the public were to perceive a statement about future policy to be unconditional, then long-term rates might fail to respond in the desired fashion should the economic outlook change materially.

Other than policies tied to current and expected future values of the overnight interest rate, the Federal Reserve has--and indeed, has been actively using--a range of policy tools to provide direct support to credit markets and thus to the broader economy. As I will elaborate, I find it useful to divide these tools into three groups. Although these sets of tools differ in important respects, they have one aspect in common: They all make use of the asset side of the Federal Reserve's balance sheet. That is, each involves the Fed's authorities to extend credit or purchase securities.

The first set of tools, which are closely tied to the central bank's traditional role as the lender of last resort, involve the provision of short-term liquidity to sound financial institutions. Over the course of the crisis, the Fed has taken a number of extraordinary actions to ensure that financial institutions have adequate access to short-term credit. These actions include creating new facilities for auctioning credit and making primary securities dealers, as well as banks, eligible to borrow at the Fed's discount window.3 For example, since August 2007 we have lowered the spread between the discount rate and the federal funds rate target from 100 basis points to 25 basis points; increased the term of discount window loans from overnight to 90 days; created the Term Auction Facility, which auctions credit to depository institutions for terms up to three months; put into place the Term Securities Lending Facility, which allows primary dealers to borrow Treasury securities from the Fed against less-liquid collateral; and initiated the Primary Dealer Credit Facility as a source of liquidity for those firms, among other actions.

Because interbank markets are global in scope, the Federal Reserve has also approved bilateral currency swap agreements with 14 foreign central banks. The swap facilities have allowed these central banks to acquire dollars from the Federal Reserve to lend to banks in their jurisdictions, which has served to ease conditions in dollar funding markets globally. In most cases, the provision of this dollar liquidity abroad was conducted in tight coordination with the Federal Reserve's own funding auctions.

Importantly, the provision of credit to financial institutions exposes the Federal Reserve to only minimal credit risk; the loans that we make to banks and primary dealers through our various facilities are generally overcollateralized and made with recourse to the borrowing firm. The Federal Reserve has never suffered any losses in the course of its normal lending to banks and, now, to primary dealers. In the case of currency swaps, the foreign central banks are responsible for repayment, not the financial institutions that ultimately receive the funds; moreover, as further security, the Federal Reserve receives an equivalent amount of foreign currency in exchange for the dollars it provides to foreign central banks.

Liquidity provision by the central bank reduces systemic risk by assuring market participants that, should short-term investors begin to lose confidence, financial institutions will be able to meet the resulting demands for cash without resorting to potentially destabilizing fire sales of assets. Moreover, backstopping the liquidity needs of financial institutions reduces funding stresses and, all else equal, should increase the willingness of those institutions to lend and make markets.

On the other hand, the provision of ample liquidity to banks and primary dealers is no panacea. Today, concerns about capital, asset quality, and credit risk continue to limit the willingness of many intermediaries to extend credit, even when liquidity is ample. Moreover, providing liquidity to financial institutions does not address directly instability or declining credit availability in critical nonbank markets, such as the commercial paper market or the market for asset-backed securities, both of which normally play major roles in the extension of credit in the United States.

To address these issues, the Federal Reserve has developed a second set of policy tools, which involve the provision of liquidity directly to borrowers and investors in key credit markets. Notably, we have introduced facilities to purchase highly rated commercial paper at a term of three months and to provide backup liquidity for money market mutual funds. In addition, the Federal Reserve and the Treasury have jointly announced a facility that will lend against AAA-rated asset-backed securities collateralized by student loans, auto loans, credit card loans, and loans guaranteed by the Small Business Administration. The Federal Reserve's credit risk exposure in the latter facility will be minimal, because the collateral will be subject to a "haircut" and the Treasury is providing $20 billion of capital as supplementary loss protection. We expect this facility to be operational next month.

The rationales and objectives of our various facilities differ, according to the nature of the problem being addressed. In some cases, as in our programs to backstop money market mutual funds, the purpose of the facility is to serve, once again in classic central bank fashion, as liquidity provider of last resort. Following a prominent fund's "breaking of the buck"--that is, a decline in its net asset value below par--in September, investors began to withdraw funds in large amounts from money market mutual funds that invest in private instruments such as commercial paper and certificates of deposit. Fund managers responded by liquidating assets and investing at only the shortest of maturities. As the pace of withdrawals increased, both the stability of the money market mutual fund industry and the functioning of the commercial paper market were threatened. The Federal Reserve responded with several programs, including a facility to finance bank purchases of high-quality asset-backed commercial paper from money market mutual funds. This facility effectively channeled liquidity to the funds, helping them to meet redemption demands without having to sell assets indiscriminately. Together with a Treasury program that provided partial insurance to investors in money market mutual funds, these efforts helped stanch the cash outflows from those funds and stabilize the industry.

The Federal Reserve's facility to buy high-quality (A1-P1) commercial paper at a term of three months was likewise designed to provide a liquidity backstop, in this case for investors and borrowers in the commercial paper market. As I mentioned, the functioning of that market deteriorated significantly in September, with borrowers finding financing difficult to obtain, and then only at high rates and very short (usually overnight) maturities. By serving as a backup source of liquidity for borrowers, the Fed's commercial paper facility was aimed at reducing investor and borrower concerns about "rollover risk," the risk that a borrower could not raise new funds to repay maturing commercial paper. The reduction of rollover risk, in turn, should increase the willingness of private investors to lend, particularly for terms longer than overnight. These various actions appear to have improved the functioning of the commercial paper market, as rates and risk spreads have come down and the average maturities of issuance have increased.

In contrast, our forthcoming asset-backed securities program, a joint effort with the Treasury, is not purely for liquidity provision. This facility will provide three-year term loans to investors against AAA-rated securities backed by recently originated consumer and small-business loans. Unlike our other lending programs, this facility combines Federal Reserve liquidity with capital provided by the Treasury, which allows it to accept some credit risk. By providing a combination of capital and liquidity, this facility will effectively substitute public for private balance sheet capacity, in a period of sharp deleveraging and risk aversion in which such capacity appears very short. If the program works as planned, it should lead to lower rates and greater availability of consumer and small business credit. Over time, by increasing market liquidity and stimulating market activity, this facility should also help to revive private lending. Importantly, if the facility for asset-backed securities proves successful, its basic framework can be expanded to accommodate higher volumes or additional classes of securities as circumstances warrant.

The Federal Reserve's third set of policy tools for supporting the functioning of credit markets involves the purchase of longer-term securities for the Fed's portfolio. For example, we recently announced plans to purchase up to $100 billion in government-sponsored enterprise (GSE) debt and up to $500 billion in GSE mortgage-backed securities over the next few quarters. Notably, mortgage rates dropped significantly on the announcement of this program and have fallen further since it went into operation. Lower mortgage rates should support the housing sector. The Committee is also evaluating the possibility of purchasing longer-term Treasury securities. In determining whether to proceed with such purchases, the Committee will focus on their potential to improve conditions in private credit markets, such as mortgage markets.

These three sets of policy tools--lending to financial institutions, providing liquidity directly to key credit markets, and buying longer-term securities--have the common feature that each represents a use of the asset side of the Fed's balance sheet, that is, they all involve lending or the purchase of securities. The virtue of these policies in the current context is that they allow the Federal Reserve to continue to push down interest rates and ease credit conditions in a range of markets, despite the fact that the federal funds rate is close to its zero lower bound.

Credit Easing versus Quantitative Easing

The Federal Reserve's approach to supporting credit markets is conceptually distinct from quantitative easing (QE), the policy approach used by the Bank of Japan from 2001 to 2006. Our approach--which could be described as "credit easing"--resembles quantitative easing in one respect: It involves an expansion of the central bank's balance sheet. However, in a pure QE regime, the focus of policy is the quantity of bank reserves, which are liabilities of the central bank; the composition of loans and securities on the asset side of the central bank's balance sheet is incidental. Indeed, although the Bank of Japan's policy approach during the QE period was quite multifaceted, the overall stance of its policy was gauged primarily in terms of its target for bank reserves. In contrast, the Federal Reserve's credit easing approach focuses on the mix of loans and securities that it holds and on how this composition of assets affects credit conditions for households and businesses. This difference does not reflect any doctrinal disagreement with the Japanese approach, but rather the differences in financial and economic conditions between the two episodes. In particular, credit spreads are much wider and credit markets more dysfunctional in the United States today than was the case during the Japanese experiment with quantitative easing. To stimulate aggregate demand in the current environment, the Federal Reserve must focus its policies on reducing those spreads and improving the functioning of private credit markets more generally.

The stimulative effect of the Federal Reserve's credit easing policies depends sensitively on the particular mix of lending programs and securities purchases that it undertakes. When markets are illiquid and private arbitrage is impaired by balance sheet constraints and other factors, as at present, one dollar of longer-term securities purchases is unlikely to have the same impact on financial markets and the economy as a dollar of lending to banks, which has in turn a different effect than a dollar of lending to support the commercial paper market. Because various types of lending have heterogeneous effects, the stance of Fed policy in the current regime--in contrast to a QE regime--is not easily summarized by a single number, such as the quantity of excess reserves or the size of the monetary base. In addition, the usage of Federal Reserve credit is determined in large part by borrower needs and thus will tend to increase when market conditions worsen and decline when market conditions improve. Setting a target for the size of the Federal Reserve's balance sheet, as in a QE regime, could thus have the perverse effect of forcing the Fed to tighten the terms and availability of its lending at times when market conditions were worsening, and vice versa.

The lack of a simple summary measure or policy target poses an important communications challenge. To minimize market uncertainty and achieve the maximum effect of its policies, the Federal Reserve is committed to providing the public as much information as possible about the uses of its balance sheet, plans regarding future uses of its balance sheet, and the criteria on which the relevant decisions are based.4

Exit Strategy

Some observers have expressed the concern that, by expanding its balance sheet, the Federal Reserve is effectively printing money, an action that will ultimately be inflationary. The Fed's lending activities have indeed resulted in a large increase in the excess reserves held by banks. Bank reserves, together with currency, make up the narrowest definition of money, the monetary base; as you would expect, this measure of money has risen significantly as the Fed's balance sheet has expanded. However, banks are choosing to leave the great bulk of their excess reserves idle, in most cases on deposit with the Fed. Consequently, the rates of growth of broader monetary aggregates, such as M1 and M2, have been much lower than that of the monetary base. At this point, with global economic activity weak and commodity prices at low levels, we see little risk of inflation in the near term; indeed, we expect inflation to continue to moderate.

However, at some point, when credit markets and the economy have begun to recover, the Federal Reserve will have to unwind its various lending programs. To some extent, this unwinding will happen automatically, as improvements in credit markets should reduce the need to use Fed facilities. Indeed, where possible we have tried to set lending rates and margins at levels that are likely to be increasingly unattractive to borrowers as financial conditions normalize. In addition, some programs--those authorized under the Federal Reserve's so-called 13(3) authority, which requires a finding that conditions in financial markets are "unusual and exigent"--will by law have to be eliminated once credit market conditions substantially normalize. However, as the unwinding of the Fed's various programs effectively constitutes a tightening of policy, the principal factor determining the timing and pace of that process will be the Committee's assessment of the condition of credit markets and the prospects for the economy.

As lending programs are scaled back, the size of the Federal Reserve's balance sheet will decline, implying a reduction in excess reserves and the monetary base. A significant shrinking of the balance sheet can be accomplished relatively quickly, as a substantial portion of the assets that the Federal Reserve holds--including loans to financial institutions, currency swaps, and purchases of commercial paper--are short-term in nature and can simply be allowed to run off as the various programs and facilities are scaled back or shut down. As the size of the balance sheet and the quantity of excess reserves in the system decline, the Federal Reserve will be able to return to its traditional means of making monetary policy--namely, by setting a target for the federal funds rate.

Although a large portion of Federal Reserve assets are short-term in nature, we do hold or expect to hold significant quantities of longer-term assets, such as the mortgage-backed securities that we will buy over the next two quarters. Although longer-term securities can also be sold, of course, we would not anticipate disposing of more than a small portion of these assets in the near term, which will slow the rate at which our balance sheet can shrink. We are monitoring the maturity composition of our balance sheet closely and do not expect a significant problem in reducing our balance sheet to the extent necessary at the appropriate time.

Importantly, the management of the Federal Reserve's balance sheet and the conduct of monetary policy in the future will be made easier by the recent congressional action to give the Fed the authority to pay interest on bank reserves. In principle, the interest rate the Fed pays on bank reserves should set a floor on the overnight interest rate, as banks should be unwilling to lend reserves at a rate lower than they can receive from the Fed. In practice, the federal funds rate has fallen somewhat below the interest rate on reserves in recent months, reflecting the very high volume of excess reserves, the inexperience of banks with the new regime, and other factors. However, as excess reserves decline, financial conditions normalize, and banks adapt to the new regime, we expect the interest rate paid on reserves to become an effective instrument for controlling the federal funds rate.

Moreover, other tools are available or can be developed to improve control of the federal funds rate during the exit stage. For example, the Treasury could resume its recent practice of issuing supplementary financing bills and placing the funds with the Federal Reserve; the issuance of these bills effectively drains reserves from the banking system, improving monetary control. Longer-term assets can be financed through repurchase agreements and other methods, which also drain reserves from the system. In considering whether to create or expand its programs, the Federal Reserve will carefully weigh the implications for the exit strategy. And we will take all necessary actions to ensure that the unwinding of our programs is accomplished smoothly and in a timely way, consistent with meeting our obligation to foster full employment and price stability.

Stabilizing the Financial System

The Federal Reserve will do its part to promote economic recovery, but other policy measures will be needed as well. The incoming Administration and the Congress are currently discussing a substantial fiscal package that, if enacted, could provide a significant boost to economic activity. In my view, however, fiscal actions are unlikely to promote a lasting recovery unless they are accompanied by strong measures to further stabilize and strengthen the financial system. History demonstrates conclusively that a modern economy cannot grow if its financial system is not operating effectively.

In the United States, a number of important steps have already been taken to promote financial stability, including the Treasury's injection of about $250 billion of capital into banking organizations, a substantial expansion of guarantees for bank liabilities by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and the Fed's various liquidity programs. Those measures, together with analogous actions in many other countries, likely prevented a global financial meltdown in the fall that, had it occurred, would have left the global economy in far worse condition than it is in today.

However, with the worsening of the economy's growth prospects, continued credit losses and asset markdowns may maintain for a time the pressure on the capital and balance sheet capacities of financial institutions. Consequently, more capital injections and guarantees may become necessary to ensure stability and the normalization of credit markets. A continuing barrier to private investment in financial institutions is the large quantity of troubled, hard-to-value assets that remain on institutions' balance sheets. The presence of these assets significantly increases uncertainty about the underlying value of these institutions and may inhibit both new private investment and new lending. Should the Treasury decide to supplement injections of capital by removing troubled assets from institutions' balance sheets, as was initially proposed for the U.S. financial rescue plan, several approaches might be considered. Public purchases of troubled assets are one possibility. Another is to provide asset guarantees, under which the government would agree to absorb, presumably in exchange for warrants or some other form of compensation, part of the prospective losses on specified portfolios of troubled assets held by banks. Yet another approach would be to set up and capitalize so-called bad banks, which would purchase assets from financial institutions in exchange for cash and equity in the bad bank. These methods are similar from an economic perspective, though they would have somewhat different operational and accounting implications. In addition, efforts to reduce preventable foreclosures, among other benefits, could strengthen the housing market and reduce mortgage losses, thereby increasing financial stability.

The public in many countries is understandably concerned by the commitment of substantial government resources to aid the financial industry when other industries receive little or no assistance. This disparate treatment, unappealing as it is, appears unavoidable. Our economic system is critically dependent on the free flow of credit, and the consequences for the broader economy of financial instability are thus powerful and quickly felt. Indeed, the destructive effects of financial instability on jobs and growth are already evident worldwide. Responsible policymakers must therefore do what they can to communicate to their constituencies why financial stabilization is essential for economic recovery and is therefore in the broader public interest.

Even as we strive to stabilize financial markets and institutions worldwide, however, we also owe the public near-term, concrete actions to limit the probability and severity of future crises. We need stronger supervisory and regulatory systems under which gaps and unnecessary duplication in coverage are eliminated, lines of supervisory authority and responsibility are clarified, and oversight powers are adequate to curb excessive leverage and risk-taking. In light of the multinational character of the largest financial firms and the globalization of financial markets more generally, regulatory oversight should be coordinated internationally to the greatest extent possible. We must continue our ongoing work to strengthen the financial infrastructure--for example, by encouraging the migration of trading in credit default swaps and other derivatives to central counterparties and exchanges. The supervisory authorities should develop the capacity for increased surveillance of the financial system as a whole, rather than focusing excessively on the condition of individual firms in isolation; and we should revisit capital regulations, accounting rules, and other aspects of the regulatory regime to ensure that they do not induce excessive procyclicality in the financial system and the economy. As we proceed with regulatory reform, however, we must take care not to take actions that forfeit the economic benefits of financial innovation and market discipline.

Particularly pressing is the need to address the problem of financial institutions that are deemed "too big to fail." It is unacceptable that large firms that the government is now compelled to support to preserve financial stability were among the greatest risk-takers during the boom period. The existence of too-big-to-fail firms also violates the presumption of a level playing field among financial institutions. In the future, financial firms of any type whose failure would pose a systemic risk must accept especially close regulatory scrutiny of their risk-taking. Also urgently needed in the United States is a new set of procedures for resolving failing nonbank institutions deemed systemically critical, analogous to the rules and powers that currently exist for resolving banks under the so-called systemic risk exception.

Conclusion

The world today faces both short-term and long-term challenges. In the near term, the highest priority is to promote a global economic recovery. The Federal Reserve retains powerful policy tools and will use them aggressively to help achieve this objective. Fiscal policy can stimulate economic activity, but a sustained recovery will also require a comprehensive plan to stabilize the financial system and restore normal flows of credit.

Despite the understandable focus on the near term, we do not have the luxury of postponing work on longer-term issues. High on the list, in light of recent events, are strengthening regulatory oversight and improving the capacity of both the private sector and regulators to detect and manage risk.

Finally, a clear lesson of the recent period is that the world is too interconnected for nations to go it alone in their economic, financial, and regulatory policies. International cooperation is thus essential if we are to address the crisis successfully and provide the basis for a healthy, sustained recovery.


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Footnotes

1. A basis point is one-hundredth of a percentage point. Return to text

2. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve (2008), "FOMC Statement and Board Approval of Discount Rate Requests of the Federal Reserve Banks of New York, Cleveland, Richmond, Atlanta, Minneapolis, and San Francisco," press release, December 16. Return to text

3. Primary dealers are broker-dealers that trade in U.S. government securities with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The New York Fed's Open Market Desk engages in trades on behalf of the Federal Reserve System to implement monetary policy. Return to text

4. Detailed information about the Federal Reserve's balance sheet is published weekly as part of the H.4.1 release. For a summary of Fed lending programs, see Forms of Federal Reserve Lending to Financial Institutions (229 KB PDF). Return to text

Bernanke strikes again!

from http://www.federalreserve.com/

Chairman Ben S. Bernanke
Remarks on Class Day 2008
At Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts
June 4, 2008

It seems to me, paradoxically, that both long ago and only yesterday I attended my own Class Day in 1975. I am pleased and honored to be invited back by the students of Harvard. Our speaker in 1975 was Dick Gregory, the social critic and comedian, who was inclined toward the sharp-edged and satiric. Central bankers don't do satire as a rule, so I am going to have to strive for "kind of interesting."
When I attended Class Day as a graduating senior, Gerald Ford was President, and an up-and-coming fellow named Alan Greenspan was his chief economic adviser. Just weeks earlier, the last Americans remaining in Saigon had been evacuated by helicopters. On a happier note, the Red Sox were on their way to winning the American League pennant. I skipped classes to attend a World Series game against the Cincinnati Reds. As was their wont in those days, the Sox came agonizingly close to a championship but ended up snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. On that score, as on others--disco music and Pet Rocks come to mind--many things are better today than they were then. In fact, that will be a theme of my remarks today.
Although 1975 was a pretty good year for the Red Sox, it was not a good one for the U.S. economy. Then as now, we were experiencing a serious oil price shock, sharply rising prices for food and other commodities, and subpar economic growth. But I see the differences between the economy of 1975 and the economy of 2008 as more telling than the similarities. Today's situation differs from that of 33 years ago in large part because our economy and society have become much more flexible and able to adapt to difficult situations and new challenges. Economic policymaking has improved as well, I believe, partly because we have learned well some of the hard lessons of the past. Of course, I do not want to minimize the challenges we currently face, and I will come back to a few of these. But I do think that our demonstrated ability to respond constructively and effectively to past economic problems provides a basis for optimism about the future.
I will focus my remarks today on two economic issues that challenged us in the 1970s and that still do so today--energy and productivity. These, obviously, are not the kind of topics chosen by many recent Class Day speakers--Will Farrell, Ali G, or Seth MacFarlane, to name a few. But, then, the Class Marshals presumably knew what they were getting when they invited an economist.
Because the members of today's graduating class--and some of your professors--were not yet born in 1975, let me begin by briefly surveying the economic landscape in the mid-1970s. The economy had just gone through a severe recession, during which output, income, and employment fell sharply and the unemployment rate rose to 9 percent. Meanwhile, consumer price inflation, which had been around 3 percent to 4 percent earlier in the decade, soared to more than 10 percent during my senior year.1
The oil price shock of the 1970s began in October 1973 when, in response to the Yom Kippur War, Arab oil producers imposed an embargo on exports. Before the embargo, in 1972, the price of imported oil was about $3.20 per barrel; by 1975, the average price was nearly $14 per barrel, more than four times greater. President Nixon had imposed economy-wide controls on wages and prices in 1971, including prices of petroleum products; in November 1973, in the wake of the embargo, the President placed additional controls on petroleum prices.2
As basic economics predicts, when a scarce resource cannot be allocated by market-determined prices, it will be allocated some other way--in this case, in what was to become an iconic symbol of the times, by long lines at gasoline stations. In 1974, in an attempt to overcome the unintended consequences of price controls, drivers in many places were permitted to buy gasoline only on odd or even days of the month, depending on the last digit of their license plate number. Moreover, with the controlled price of U.S. crude oil well below world prices, growth in domestic exploration slowed and production was curtailed--which, of course, only made things worse.
In addition to creating long lines at gasoline stations, the oil price shock exacerbated what was already an intensifying buildup of inflation and inflation expectations. In another echo of today, the inflationary situation was further worsened by rapidly rising prices of agricultural products and other commodities.
Economists generally agree that monetary policy performed poorly during this period. In part, this was because policymakers, in choosing what they believed to be the appropriate setting for monetary policy, overestimated the productive capacity of the economy. I'll have more to say about this shortly. Federal Reserve policymakers also underestimated both their own contributions to the inflationary problems of the time and their ability to curb that inflation. For example, on occasion they blamed inflation on so-called cost-push factors such as union wage pressures and price increases by large, market-dominating firms; however, the abilities of unions and firms to push through inflationary wage and price increases were symptoms of the problem, not the underlying cause. Several years passed before the Federal Reserve gained a new leadership that better understood the central bank's role in the inflation process and that sustained anti-inflationary monetary policies would actually work. Beginning in 1979, such policies were implemented successfully--although not without significant cost in terms of lost output and employment--under Fed Chairman Paul Volcker. For the Federal Reserve, two crucial lessons from this experience were, first, that high inflation can seriously destabilize the economy and, second, that the central bank must take responsibility for achieving price stability over the medium term.
Fast-forward now to 2003. In that year, crude oil cost a little more than $30 per barrel.3 Since then, crude oil prices have increased more than fourfold, proportionally about as much as in the 1970s. Now, as in 1975, adjusting to such high prices for crude oil has been painful. Gas prices around $4 a gallon are a huge burden for many households, as well as for truckers, manufacturers, farmers, and others. But, in many other ways, the economic consequences have been quite different from those of the 1970s. One obvious difference is what you don't see: drivers lining up on odd or even days to buy gasoline because of price controls or signs at gas stations that say "No gas." And until the recent slowdown--which is more the result of conditions in the residential housing market and in financial markets than of higher oil prices--economic growth was solid and unemployment remained low, unlike what we saw following oil price increases in the '70s.
For a central banker, a particularly critical difference between then and now is what has happened to inflation and inflation expectations. The overall inflation rate has averaged about 3-1/2 percent over the past four quarters, significantly higher than we would like but much less than the double-digit rates that inflation reached in the mid-1970s and then again in 1980. Moreover, the increase in inflation has been milder this time--on the order of 1 percentage point over the past year as compared with the 6 percentage point jump that followed the 1973 oil price shock.4 From the perspective of monetary policy, just as important as the behavior of actual inflation is what households and businesses expect to happen to inflation in the future, particularly over the longer term. If people expect an increase in inflation to be temporary and do not build it into their longer-term plans for setting wages and prices, then the inflation created by a shock to oil prices will tend to fade relatively quickly. Some indicators of longer-term inflation expectations have risen in recent months, which is a significant concern for the Federal Reserve. We will need to monitor that situation closely. However, changes in long-term inflation expectations have been measured in tenths of a percentage point this time around rather than in whole percentage points, as appeared to be the case in the mid-1970s. Importantly, we see little indication today of the beginnings of a 1970s-style wage-price spiral, in which wages and prices chased each other ever upward.
A good deal of economic research has looked at the question of why the inflation response to the oil shock has been relatively muted in the current instance.5 One factor, which illustrates my point about the adaptability and flexibility of the U.S. economy, is the pronounced decline in the energy intensity of the economy since the 1970s. Since 1975, the energy required to produce a given amount of output in the United States has fallen by about half.6 This great improvement in energy efficiency was less the result of government programs than of steps taken by households and businesses in response to higher energy prices, including substantial investments in more energy-efficient equipment and means of transportation. This improvement in energy efficiency is one of the reasons why a given increase in crude oil prices does less damage to the U.S. economy today than it did in the 1970s.
Another reason is the performance of monetary policy. The Federal Reserve and other central banks have learned the lessons of the 1970s. Because monetary policy works with a lag, the short-term inflationary effects of a sharp increase in oil prices can generally not be fully offset. However, since Paul Volcker's time, the Federal Reserve has been firmly committed to maintaining a low and stable rate of inflation over the longer term. And we recognize that keeping longer-term inflation expectations well anchored is essential to achieving the goal of low and stable inflation. Maintaining confidence in the Fed's commitment to price stability remains a top priority as the central bank navigates the current complex situation.
Although our economy has thus far dealt with the current oil price shock comparatively well, the United States and the rest of the world still face significant challenges in dealing with the rising global demand for energy, especially if continued demand growth and constrained supplies maintain intense pressure on prices. The silver lining of high energy prices is that they provide a powerful incentive for action--for conservation, including investment in energy-saving technologies; for the investment needed to bring new oil supplies to market; and for the development of alternative conventional and nonconventional energy sources. The government, in addition to the market, can usefully address energy concerns, for example, by supporting basic research and adopting well-designed regulatory policies to promote important social objectives such as protecting the environment. As we saw after the oil price shock of the 1970s, given some time, the economy can become much more energy-efficient even as it continues to grow and living standards improve.
Let me turn now to the other economic challenge that I want to highlight today--the productivity performance of our economy. At this point you may be saying to yourself, "Is it too late to book Ali G?" However, anyone who stayed awake through EC 10 understands why this issue is so important.7 As Adam Smith pointed out in 1776, in the long run, more than any other factor, the productivity of the workforce determines a nation's standard of living.
The decades following the end of World War II were remarkable for their industrial innovation and creativity. From 1948 to 1973, output per hour of work grew by nearly 3 percent per year, on average.8 But then, for the next 20 years or so, productivity growth averaged only about 1-1/2 percent per year, barely half its previous rate. Predictably, the rate of increase in the standard of living slowed as well, and to about the same extent. The difference between 3 percent and 1-1/2 percent may sound small. But at 3 percent per year, the standard of living would double about every 23 years, or once every generation; by contrast, at 1-1/2 percent, a doubling would occur only roughly every 47 years, or once every other generation.
Among the many consequences of the productivity slowdown was a further complication for the monetary policy makers of the 1970s. Detecting shifts in economic trends is difficult in real time, and most economists and policymakers did not fully appreciate the extent of the productivity slowdown until the late 1970s. This further influenced the policymakers of the time toward running a monetary policy that was too accommodative. The resulting overheating of the economy probably exacerbated the inflation problem of that decade.9
Productivity growth revived in the mid-1990s, as I mentioned, illustrating once again the resilience of the American economy.10 Since 1995, productivity has increased at about a 2-1/2 percent annual rate. A great deal of intellectual effort has been expended in trying to explain the recent performance and to forecast the future evolution of productivity. Much very good work has been conducted here at Harvard by Dale Jorgenson (my senior thesis adviser in 1975, by the way) and his colleagues, and other important research in the area has been done at the Federal Reserve Board.11 One key finding of that research is that, to have an economic impact, technological innovations must be translated into successful commercial applications. This country's competitive, market-based system, its flexible capital and labor markets, its tradition of entrepreneurship, and its technological strengths--to which Harvard and other universities make a critical contribution--help ensure that that happens on an ongoing basis.
While private-sector initiative was the key ingredient in generating the pickup in productivity growth, government policy was constructive, in part through support of basic research but also to a substantial degree by promoting economic competition. Beginning in the late 1970s, the federal government deregulated a number of key industries, including air travel, trucking, telecommunications, and energy. The resulting increase in competition promoted cost reductions and innovation, leading in turn to new products and industries. It is difficult to imagine that we would have online retailing today if the transportation and telecommunications industries had not been deregulated. In addition, the lowering of trade barriers promoted productivity gains by increasing competition, expanding markets, and increasing the pace of technology transfer.12
Finally, as a central banker, I would be remiss if I failed to mention the contribution of monetary policy to the improved productivity performance. By damping business cycles and by keeping inflation under control, a sound monetary policy improves the ability of households and firms to plan and increases their willingness to undertake the investments in skills, research, and physical capital needed to support continuing gains in productivity.
Just as the productivity slowdown was associated with a slower growth of real per capita income, the productivity resurgence since the mid-1990s has been accompanied by a pickup in real income growth. One measure of average living standards, real consumption per capita, is nearly 35 percent higher today than in 1995. In addition, the flood of innovation that helped spur the productivity resurgence has created many new job opportunities, and more than a few fortunes. But changing technology has also reduced job opportunities for some others--bank tellers and assembly-line workers, for example. And that is the crux of a whole new set of challenges.
Even though average economic well-being has increased considerably over time, the degree of inequality in economic outcomes over the past three decades has increased as well. Economists continue to grapple with the reasons for this trend. But as best we can tell, the increase in inequality probably is due to a number of factors, notably including technological change that seems to have favored higher-skilled workers more than lower-skilled ones. In addition, some economists point to increased international trade and the declining role of labor unions as other, probably lesser contributing factors.
What should we do about rising economic inequality? Answering this question inevitably involves difficult value judgments and tradeoffs. But approaches that inhibit the dynamism of our economy would clearly be a step in the wrong direction. To be sure, new technologies and increased international trade can lead to painful dislocations as some workers lose their jobs or see the demand for their particular skills decline. However, hindering the adoption of new technologies or inhibiting trade flows would do far more harm than good over the longer haul. In the short term, the better approach is to adopt policies that help those who are displaced by economic change. By doing so, we not only provide assistance to those who need it but help to secure public support for the economic flexibility that is essential for prosperity.
In the long term, however, the best way by far to improve economic opportunity and to reduce inequality is to increase the educational attainment and skills of American workers. The productivity surge in the decades after World War II corresponded to a period in which educational attainment was increasing rapidly; in recent decades, progress on that front has been far slower. Moreover, inequalities in education and in access to education remain high. As we think about improving education and skills, we should also look beyond the traditional K-12 and 4-year-college system--as important as it is--to recognize that education should be lifelong and can come in many forms. Early childhood education, community colleges, vocational schools, on-the-job training, online courses, adult education--all of these are vehicles of demonstrated value in increasing skills and lifetime earning power. The use of a wide range of methods to address the pressing problems of inadequate skills and economic inequality would be entirely consistent with the themes of economic adaptability and flexibility that I have emphasized in my remarks.
I will close by shifting from the topic of education in general to your education specifically. Through effort, talent, and doubtless some luck, you have succeeded in acquiring an excellent education. Your education--more precisely, your ability to think critically and creatively--is your greatest asset. And unlike many assets, the more you draw on it, the faster it grows. Put it to good use.
The poor forecasting record of economists is legendary, but I will make a forecast in which I am very confident: Whatever you expect your life and work to be like 10, 20, or 30 years from now, the reality will be quite different. In looking over the 30th anniversary report on my own class, I was struck by the great diversity of vocations and avocations that have engaged my classmates. To be sure, the volume was full of attorneys and physicians and professors as well as architects, engineers, editors, bankers, and even a few economists. Many listed the title "vice president," and, not a few, "president." But the class of 1975 also includes those who listed their occupations as composer, environmental advocate, musician, playwright, rabbi, conflict resolution coach, painter, community organizer, and essayist. And even for those of us with the more conventional job descriptions, the nature of our daily work and its relationship to the economy and society is, I am sure, very different from what we might have guessed in 1975. My point is only that you cannot predict your path. You can only try to be as prepared as possible for the opportunities, as well as the disappointments, that will come your way. For people, as for economies, adaptability and flexibility count for a great deal.
Wherever your path leads, I hope you use your considerable talents and energy in endeavors that engage and excite you and benefit not only yourselves, but also in some measure your country and your world. Today, I wish you and your families a day of joyous celebration. Congratulations.

He is right to focus on energy and productivity. An economy's affluence is directly co-related to increase in energy efficiency, increase in energy availability and increase in worker productivity. In the last couple of days he has made it amply clear that his focus (and therefore the Fed's) is now on Inflation regardless of a slowing economic environment. This is the right approach as the Fed should really be hiking rates at this point to stop inflation eating away at people's wages. However, with a strike on Iran on the cards by Israel before the end of the Bush presidency likely, the resulting oil spike if not controlled quickly would lead to massive global stagflation and a likely severe global recession.

Bernanke breaks silence

from www.federalreserve.gov

Chairman Ben S. Bernanke
Remarks on the economic outlook
At the International Monetary Conference, Barcelona, Spain (via satellite)
June 3, 2008
As you know, financial markets in the United States and in a number of other industrialized countries have been under considerable strain since late last summer. Financial market conditions have in turn affected economic prospects, most notably by affecting the cost and availability of new credit.
Much discussion of the turmoil has focused on problems that have arisen with respect to specific financial markets and financial instruments. Understanding these institutional details is, of course, essential to the task of restoring more normal functioning to the financial system. Stepping back, however, one can see--at least in retrospect--that the turmoil has been some time in the making and reflects the combined influence of several powerful, longer-term developments.
Today, I will briefly discuss some longer-term factors that underlie recent developments; trace how these factors, individually and in combination, have affected both the financial markets and the economy; and describe how the Federal Reserve has responded to the challenges we face.
The Sources of the Financial Turmoil: A Longer-Term PerspectiveAlthough the severity of the financial stresses became apparent only in August, several longer-term developments served as prologue for the recent turmoil and helped bring us to the current situation.

The first of these was the U.S. housing boom, which began in the mid-1990s and picked up steam around 2000. Between 1996 and 2005, house prices nationwide increased about 90 percent. During the years from 2000 to 2005 alone, house prices increased by roughly 60 percent--far outstripping the increases in incomes and general prices--and single-family home construction increased by about 40 percent. But, as you know, starting in 2006, the boom turned to bust. Over the past two years, building activity has fallen by more than half and now is well below where it was in 2000. House prices have shown significant declines in many areas of the country.

A second critical development was an even broader credit boom, in which lenders and investors aggressively sought out new opportunities to take credit risk even as market risk premiums contracted. Aspects of the credit boom included rapid growth in the volumes of private equity deals and leveraged lending and the increased use of complex and often opaque investment vehicles, including structured credit products. The explosive growth of subprime mortgage lending in recent years was yet another facet of the broader credit boom. Expanding access to homeownership is an important social goal, and responsible subprime lending is beneficial for both borrowers and lenders. But, clearly, much of the subprime lending that took place during the latter stages of the credit boom in 2005 and 2006 was done very poorly.

A third longer-term factor contributing to recent financial and economic developments is the unprecedented growth in developing and emerging market economies. From the U.S. perspective, this growth has been a double-edged sword. On the one hand, low-cost imports from emerging markets for many years increased U.S. living standards and made the Fed's job of managing inflation easier. Moreover, currently, the demand for U.S. exports arising from strong global growth has been an important offset to the factors restraining domestic demand, including housing and tight credit. On the other hand, the rapid growth in the emerging markets and the associated sharp rise in their demand for raw materials have been--together with a variety of constraints on supply--a major cause of the escalation in the relative prices of oil and other commodities, which has placed intense economic pressure on many U.S. households and businesses.

In the financial sphere, the three longer-term developments I have identified are linked by the fact that a substantial increase in the net supply of saving in emerging market economies contributed to both the U.S. housing boom and the broader credit boom.1 The sources of this increase in net saving included rapid growth in high-saving East Asian countries and, outside of China, reduced investment rates in that region; large buildups in foreign exchange reserves in a number of emerging markets; and the enormous increases in the revenues received by exporters of oil and other commodities. The pressure of these net savings flows led to lower long-term real interest rates around the world, stimulated asset prices (including house prices), and pushed current accounts toward deficit in the industrial countries--notably the United States--that received these flows.

To be sure, the large inflows of savings and low global interest rates presented a valuable opportunity to the recipient countries, provided they invested the inflows wisely. Unfortunately, this did not always occur, as an increased appetite for risk-taking--a "reaching for yield"--stimulated some financial innovations and lending practices that proved imprudent or otherwise questionable. Regulators identified some of these issues in real time; for example, federal banking regulators issued new guidance on nontraditional mortgage lending and on commercial real estate lending. The Federal Reserve, in cooperation with the other supervisors, encouraged improvements in market infrastructure and conducted a series of targeted reviews designed to improve risk-management practice with respect to derivatives, exposures to hedge funds, leveraged lending, and other areas. And, in preparation for the new Basel II capital regulations, supervisors required more-demanding standards for the measurement and management of risk. Despite these efforts, however, the risk-management systems of many financial institutions proved inadequate in the face of a major housing downturn and substantial disruptions in market liquidity.
The current economic and financial situation reflects, in significant part, the unwinding of two of these longer-term developments--the housing boom and the credit boom--and the continuation of the pressure of global demand on commodity prices.
The housing boom came to an end because rising prices made housing increasingly unaffordable. The end of rapid house price increases in turn undermined a basic premise of many adjustable-rate subprime loans--that home price appreciation alone would always generate enough equity to permit the borrower to refinance and thereby avoid ever having to pay the fully-indexed interest rate. When that premise was shown to be false and defaults on subprime mortgages rose sharply, investors quickly backpedaled from mortgage-related securities. The reduced availability of mortgage credit caused housing to weaken further.
The losses from subprime mortgages have been significant in themselves, but their greater impact was to trigger the end of the broader credit boom. Notably, as subprime losses forced the credit rating agencies to downgrade what had been highly rated mortgage-backed securities, investors also came to doubt the reliability of ratings that had been awarded to other highly complex securities. As a result, investors became much more cautious and reversed their aggressive risk-taking of the credit boom period. The resulting pullback affected a much broader range of securities, including leveraged and syndicated loans, asset-backed commercial paper, commercial mortgage-backed securities, and a variety of structured credit products. Large financial institutions, especially in the United States and Europe, were particularly affected by these events, having reported a total of roughly $300 billion in writedowns and credit losses. These institutions have also been forced to bring onto their balance sheets the assets of sponsored investment vehicles that can no longer be financed on a standalone basis. Fortunately, most financial institutions entered this episode with strong capital positions, and many have raised substantial amounts of new capital. Still, balance sheet pressures and the relatively high cost of new bank capital have reduced the willingness and ability of these institutions to make markets and extend new credit. Prospectively, financial conditions seem likely to be closely tied to both domestic and global economic developments, including the course of the prices of oil and other commodities.
This brief overview makes clear that both global and domestic factors have played important roles in recent developments in the United States. The housing and credit booms were driven to some extent by global savings flows, but they also reflected domestic factors, such as weaknesses in risk measurement and management and lax standards in subprime lending. Higher commodity prices are for the most part a global phenomenon, but U.S. dependence on oil imports makes this country quite vulnerable on that score.
The OutlookWith this broader perspective as background, I turn now to a brief discussion of the current situation and outlook. Broadly speaking, the functioning of financial markets has improved of late, but conditions remain strained and some key funding and securitization markets have shown only tentative signs of recovery. Some borrowers, such as highly-rated corporations, retain good access to credit, but credit conditions generally remain restrictive in areas related to residential or commercial real estate.
Residential construction continues to contract, and the overhang of unsold new homes remains large, although it has declined some in absolute terms. Consumer spending has thus far held up a bit better than expected, but households continue to face significant headwinds, including falling house prices, a softer job market, tighter credit, and higher energy prices, and consumer sentiment has declined sharply since the fall. Businesses are also facing challenges, including rapidly escalating costs of raw materials and weaker domestic demand. However, the strength of foreign demand for U.S. goods and services has offset, to some extent, the slowing of domestic sales.
Overall economic growth was quite slow but apparently positive in both the fourth quarter of 2007 and the first quarter of this year. Activity during the current quarter is also likely to be relatively weak. We may see somewhat better economic conditions during the second half of 2008, reflecting the effects of monetary and fiscal stimulus, reduced drag from residential construction, further progress in the repair of financial and credit markets, and still solid demand from abroad. This baseline forecast is consistent with our recently released projections, which also see growth picking up further in 2009. However, until the housing market, and particularly house prices, shows clearer signs of stabilization, growth risks will remain to the downside. Recent increases in oil prices pose additional downside risks to growth.
Inflation has remained high, largely reflecting continued sharp increases in the prices of globally traded commodities. Thus far, the pass-through of high raw materials costs to domestic labor costs and the prices of most other products has been limited, in part because of softening domestic demand. However, the continuation of this pattern is not guaranteed and will bear close attention. Futures markets continue to predict--albeit with a great range of uncertainty--that commodity prices will level out, a forecast consistent with our expectation of some overall slowing in the global economy and thus in the demand for raw materials. A rough stabilization of commodity prices, even at high levels, would result in a relatively rapid moderation of inflation, consistent with the projections of Federal Reserve governors and Reserve Bank presidents for 2009 and 2010. Unfortunately, the prices of a number of commodities, most notably oil, have continued upward recently, even as expectations of future policy rates and the foreign exchange value of the dollar have remained generally stable in the past few months. The possibility that commodity prices will continue to rise is an important risk to the inflation forecast. Another significant upside risk to inflation is that high headline inflation, if sustained, might lead the public to expect higher long-term inflation rates, an expectation that could ultimately become self-confirming.
The Federal Reserve's Policy ResponseThe Federal Reserve's mandate is to foster maximum sustainable employment and price stability. To achieve these goals, we must also support the return of financial markets to more normal functioning.
The Federal Reserve is pursuing its objectives through several means. First, we have eased monetary policy substantially and proactively to address the sharp deterioration in financial conditions and to forestall some of the potential adverse effects on the broader economy. Our decisive policy actions were premised on the view that a more gradual reduction in short-term rates could well have failed to contain the financial and economic problems confronting us. For now, policy seems well positioned to promote moderate growth and price stability over time. We will, of course, be watching the evolving situation closely and are prepared to act as needed to meet our dual mandate.
In collaboration with our colleagues at the Treasury, we continue to carefully monitor developments in foreign exchange markets. The challenges that our economy has faced over the past year or so have generated some downward pressures on the foreign exchange value of the dollar, which have contributed to the unwelcome rise in import prices and consumer price inflation. We are attentive to the implications of changes in the value of the dollar for inflation and inflation expectations and will continue to formulate policy to guard against risks to both parts of our dual mandate, including the risk of an erosion in longer-term inflation expectations. Over time, the Federal Reserve's commitment to both price stability and maximum sustainable employment and the underlying strengths of the U.S. economy--including flexible markets and robust innovation and productivity--will be key factors ensuring that the dollar remains a strong and stable currency.
Second, to improve market liquidity and functioning, we have taken a range of measures to ensure that financial institutions have adequate access to central bank liquidity.2 The resulting reductions in funding pressures, together with the increased confidence created by the assurance that backstop liquidity is available to eligible institutions, should help to promote an orderly resolution of current market dislocations. In recognition of the global nature of financial markets, we have also cooperated with other major central banks to ensure that central bank liquidity is deployed where needed.
Finally, we are taking action in our role as regulators. We have worked with lenders and servicers to encourage appropriate modifications of distressed mortgage loans, and we have proposed new rules to improve disclosure and to ban unfair or deceptive acts and practices in mortgage lending. We are also collaborating with other regulators, both domestically and abroad, to put in place changes that will help make the financial system less vulnerable in the future. Among the changes we expect to see are strengthening of capital and liquidity rules, greater disclosure requirements, an increased emphasis on the measurement and management of firmwide risks, and further steps to increase the transparency and resilience of the financial infrastructure. Our goal is to emerge from this difficult period with a financial system that will be more stable without being less innovative, with a more effective balance between market discipline and regulation.
ReferencesBernanke, Ben S. (2005). "The Global Saving Glut and the U.S. Current Account Deficit," speech delivered at the Homer Jones Lecture, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, St. Louis, Mo., April 14.
Bernanke, Ben S. (2008). "Liquidity Provision by the Federal Reserve," speech delivered at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta Financial Markets Conference, Sea Island, Ga., May 13.

Interesting analysis. He lays the blame of the rise in commodity prices at the door of Chindia. The problem ofcourse is more complicated. Chindia only partially contributed to the current crisis. It is the Fed's own actions (cutting rates under CPI while non-core and supposedly variable commodities like food and oil BOOMED) that have contributed to the rise in the prices of commodities. The Fed is only getting concerned about the dollar NOW? Where were they in the last 5 years? The US has had officially been in a low dollar policy (orderly decline in USD) for some time. Does this signal and end to the low dollar policy? I doubt it.