Fed’s Mester says half-point rate hikes are needed to fight inflation

Cleveland Federal Reserve President Loretta Mester said Friday that she doesn’t see ample evidence that inflation has peaked and thus is on board with supporting a series of aggressive interest ...

Opinion: The Federal Reserve is shrinking its balance sheet under duress, which makes a soft landing nearly impossible

The Federal Reserve has begun to downsize its balance sheet. What does that mean for you? First, you must understand where the balance sheet’s expansion came from and why that policy was pursued. Then...

Fed Vice Chair Lael Brainard says it’s ‘very hard to see the case’ for the Fed pausing rate hikes

Federal Reserve Vice Chair Lael Brainard said Thursday that it’s unlikely the central bank will be taking a break from its current rate-hiking cycle anytime soon. Though she stressed that Fed po...

Investors revisit muni bonds amid higher yields and strong credit

David Jakle | Image Source | Getty Images It’s been a tough year for municipal bonds, with investors cashing out amid rising interest rates. However, higher yields and strong credit may be spark...

The Fed’s Mary Daly says rate hikes should continue until inflation is tamed

San Francisco Federal Reserve President Mary Daly said Wednesday she backs raising interest rates aggressively until inflation comes down to a reasonable level. Those moves likely would entail multipl...

Consumer Confidence Declined In May Amid Inflation And Rising Interest Rates

Getty Images Key takeaways The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index fell in May amidst 40-year-high inflation Consumers cite increasing worries about food and energy prices, plus decreasing de...

Dealer Profits On Auto Finance Way Up; It’s Not The Interest, It’s The Add-Ons

Auto finance is a major profit center for U.S. auto dealerships. Dealers say they make much more on … [+] products like service contracts, and not so much on their share of the customer’s ...

Maybe Things Aren’t That Bad For The Stock Market After All

the dark clouds part getty So was last week’s 6.6% market advance a head fake after six weeks of red ink for the S&P 500? Odds are that May’s last full week was an interlude in the steady downtren...

Fed Governor Christopher Waller says he’s prepared to take rates past ‘neutral’ to fight inflation

Christopher Waller, U.S. President Donald Trump’s nominee for governor of the Federal Reserve, listens during a Senate Banking Committee confirmation hearing in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, Fe...

Lumber Prices Slump With Rising Interest Rates

Lumber prices have come crashing down in a new sign of how rising interest rates are deflating markets that boomed during the pandemic. Wood prices were a leading indicator of the supply-chain problem...

Are Shorter Business Cycles The Next Big Change In Economies?

LONDON – OCTOBER 07: In this photo illustration, a man looks at a graph representing the 12 month … [+] decline of the FTSE 100 share index on October 7, 2008 in London. Financial markets ...

This Rally Could Force the Fed to Raise Rates Higher

The markets make the news, not the other way around, an insight that has been quite humbling to one who has made a living by reporting and analyzing the impact of news on financial markets. Consider t...

Good News For Markets As Fed’s Preferred Inflation Metric May Have Peaked

Jerome Powell, chairman of the US Federal Reserve, from left, Lael Brainard, vice chair of the US … [+] Federal Reserve, Philip Jefferson, governor of the US Federal Reserve, and Lisa Cook, gove...

Dow books 4th day of gains, stocks rally after Fed minutes signal flexibility on interest rate hikes

Stocks closed higher Wednesday as investors took away a message of flexibility from the release of minutes of the early May Federal Reserve meeting about its path to higher interest rates. How did sto...

Fed minutes: May 2022 – Monetary policy may move into restrictive territory

Federal Reserve officials earlier this month stressed the need to raise interest rates quickly and possibly more than markets anticipate to tackle a burgeoning inflation problem, minutes from their me...

Opinion: The Fed must boost rates by a full percentage point at every meeting to bring down inflation and avoid a job-killing recession

The Fed has taken aim at inflation, but it isn’t moving fast enough. Earlier this month the Fed boosted the federal funds rate by half a point, and more half and quarter point increases are almost cer...

Mortgage demand slides further, even as interest rates pull back slightly

A for sale sign is posted in front of a home that is listed for over $1 million on April 29, 2022 in San Francisco, California. Justin Sullivan | Getty Images Mortgage rates turned lower for the secon...

Stocks Will Sink Further, Economist Rosenberg Says

Stocks are slumping, with the S&P 500 down 18% year to date. And prominent Wall Street economist David Rosenberg says the carnage isn’t over. “We always believed these past two years represented a...

Recession won’t strike stocks despite ugly market

While retail investors head for the exits as stock prices sharply fluctuate, Evercore ISI’s Julian Emanuel wants to put money to work. He calls the market environment very ugly, but he believes ...

Markets: The Correction Is Not Over Yet

The recent selloff in the stock market could be the start of a reprieve, hedge fund experts and market strategists said. The Dow rose by 618 points or 1.98% on Monday following Friday’s downturn that ...

Silicon Valley’s Prosperous Existence Is the Surest Sign of the Fed’s Unctuous Irrelevance

A headline at Forbes.com last week indicated rising layoffs at Silicon Valley start-ups that are said to foretell a quiet summer for venture capitalists. On the same day, an A1 story in the Wall Stree...

Stephen Roach gives stagflation warning, calls peak inflation absurd

Stagflation is making a comeback, according to former Morgan Stanley Asia chairman Stephen Roach. He warns the U.S. is on a dangerous path that leads to higher prices coupled with slower growth. ̶...

Why Financial Markets Are Struggling

Close up of golden Bull and Bear standing on a Stock Market Newspaper getty U.S. stock markets continue to struggle amid Fed policy shift, inflation worries, and recession risk. Will inflation persist...

Fed isn’t focused on impact of rates on stocks, Esther George Says

Kansas City Federal Reserve President Esther George said Thursday that higher interest rates are needed now to bring down inflation and policymakers are not focused on the impact that is having on the...

A ‘summer of pain’ for stocks? Nasdaq Composite could plunge 75% from peak, and S&P 500 skid 45% from top, warns Guggenheim’s Scott Minerd

The carnage playing out in the U.S. stock market on Wednesday is likely an amuse-bouche compared with the devastation on the menu for the bulls in the coming months and years, Guggenheim Partners Glob...

Is the Housing Market Slowing Down? Takeaways From Real Estate Earnings.

Several housing metrics due this week are expected to show signs of a slowdown. That sentiment has also been echoed in recent comments from real estate technology companies on earnings calls. Affordab...

Powell says the Fed will not hesitate to keep raising rates until inflation comes down

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell emphasized his resolve to get inflation down, saying Tuesday he will back interest rate increases until prices start falling back toward a healthy level. “...

MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin Wager Has Turned Into A Losing Bet

Bitcoin getty MicroStrategy MSTR embarked on a strategy of using its cash and then debt to buy alternative assets when it announced its June 2020 quarter results on July 28, 2020. Over almost two year...

Home affordability at 2007 bubble level but crash unlikely: Blackstone

A major Wall Street firm is drawing a striking parallel to the housing bubble. Blackstone’s Joe Zidle calls homes almost as unaffordable as the 2007 peak. Yet, he believes a crash is unlikely du...

Considering a Lump-Sum Pension Payout? Here’s What to Know, and Why to Act Soon.

Workers who are considering taking a lump-sum payment from their employer-sponsored pension in retirement shouldn’t wait much longer to decide, as the Federal Reserve’s planned series of interest-rate...

3 economists predict when competition in the housing market will decline

When will you see competition decrease in the housing market? Getty Images Mortgage rates on 30-year fixed rate loans have climbed from about 3.5% earlier this year to upwards of 5.6%, and pros say th...

More Than One In Six Mainland Chinese On 2022 Forbes Billionaires List Are Now Below The Cut

Declines in China stock prices have reduced the number of billionaires in mainland China. (Photo by … [+] Yifan Ding/Getty Images) Getty Images When it comes to being home to a large number of t...