Free Republic

What kind of natural disaster would be bad enough to completely shut down the operations of the New York Federal Reserve Bank? It would have to be something very unusual, and apparently the New York Fed is very concerned that such an event could happen. According to Reuters, the New York Fed has been transferring personnel to Chicago and building up its satellite office there just in case a “natural disaster” makes it impossible for normal operations to continue in New York…

Closely followed market watcher Jim Grant disputes the argument that there's no harm in the Federal Reserve keeping interest rates near zero percent—calling for the cost of borrowing money to be determined by the free market. He said Tuesday the price of the central bank's persistent easy money policies is on display currently in the form of stifling American enterprise and sending millions of people from the workforce "more or less permanently." "The prospective cost is the unmasking of the misallocations of capital that will have come about through the levitation of asset prices," including real estate, Grant said. "If...

The Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank appears to be betting against the American economy. The branch believes that the national economic growth rate has fallen dramatically. Blaming the downgrade on issues such as harsh weather, the projected growth rate has been slashed several times already, now down to zero. First quarter growth has slipped from an already anemic near 2.0% continually down. This comes as Americans have more money to spend from falling gas prices. Many factors are going into the decision, which mirrors similar moves during previous winters. The Fed believes that much of the slowdown is due to the...

David Alan Stockman interviewed on CBS-TV 60 Minutes (October 2010) Highlights of recent interview by Harry Dent. David Stockman: People don't want to hear the reality and the truth that we're facing. But I think there is an enormous appetite out in the country to get a different perspective than what you have from the media day in and day out, so I say the fed is out of control. Its balance sheet is exploded. It's printing money like never before. Zero interest rates for 70 months have basically destroyed the pricing function in the financial markets. I said...

Many stock market investors have, in the back of their minds, the comforting illusion that the Quantitative Easing with which the Fed showered Wall Street during the past three years could restart if the market falters. (Under Quantitative Easing, the Fed gave banks $85 billion each month to help stimulate lending and spending and to drive up stock prices). Some also see that the impending rise in interest rates can be reversed if the economy begins to drop. Both assumptions are really illusions. The factors that impelled an end to Quantitative Easing and to higher interest rates rule out a...

How can you tell if you’re living in a police state? The short answer is that you’re living in a police state when everyone becomes a suspected criminal or terrorist. And if the following report is any indicator, then welcome to the Reich. The Justice Department has ordered bank tellers across America to contact law enforcement if they suspect your cash withdrawal may have something to do with illicit activity. There doesn’t need to be proof, or any sort of red flag indicator – merely suspicion by the bank teller processing your transaction is now enough to have you investigated...

I don't know too much about Jim Rickards, just found this to be an interesting video about the overall economy and some tidbits about what our government agencies are up to. The video is a 45 minutes long interview of sorts and discussion. Just posting in the event other are interested.

Six years after the Federal Reserve’s “stress tests” began, the biggest Wall Street banks still are straining to decipher them. ...

News of a burst of hiring last month sent bond prices lower and the dollar higher in early trading on Friday, while the stock market opened lower. Apple rose 1 percent after it was announced that the company would be joining the Dow Jones industrial average, replacing AT&T. AT&T fell 1 percent. KEEPING SCORE The Dow fell 0.98 percent and the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index was down 0.85 percent. The Nasdaq composite index dropped 0.60 percent. MORE JOBS United States employers extended a healthy streak of hiring in February by adding 295,000 jobs, the 12th straight monthly gain above...

Janet Yellen is very alarmed that some members of Congress want to conduct a comprehensive audit of the Federal Reserve for the first time since it was created. If the Fed is doing everything correctly, why should Yellen be alarmed? What does she have to hide? During testimony before Congress on Tuesday, she made “central bank independence” sound like it was the holy grail. Even though every other government function is debated politically in this country, Yellen insists that what the Federal Reserve does is “too important” to be influenced by the American people. Does any other government agency ever...

Rand Paul traveled to Des Moines, Iowa, recently and delivered a sure-fire applause line. “Anybody here want to audit the Fed?” the Kentucky senator asked. “Anybody feel that the Fed’s out to get us?” He followed it up with an op-ed comparing the Federal Reserve to Lehman Brothers and calling it essentially bankrupt. The bash-the-Fed routine, perfected by Paul’s father, former Texas congressman Ron Paul, is political gold with libertarian voters suspicious of all federal authority, especially a central bank with a $4.5 trillion balance sheet.

A long-running campaign to fully subject the Federal Reserve to outside review could come down to a handful of moderate Democrats. The “Audit the Fed” movement has grown from an oddball pet project of former Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) into legislation that was passed with broad bipartisan majorities in the House two Congresses running, before stalling in Democratic-led Senates. With Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) looking to follow in his father’s footsteps with a new audit bill, the prospects of a GOP-controlled Congress actually sending a measure to the president is more real than it has ever been before. But clearing...

Sen. Rand Paul isn't happy that the Federal Reserve is mobilizing against his legislation that would subject the central bank's monetary policy decisions to an audit. "It is alarming that the Federal Reserve, which was granted Monopoly money-making power, is now specifically trying to stop my legislation," the Kentucky Republican wrote in a column published by the conservative publication Breitbart Tuesday. "The Fed, with unlimited ability to print money, now prints that money to lobby against congressional oversight," Paul added. "It is a disgrace and every citizen in the land should rise up and say: We the people are in...

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- Illinois residents might not be able to use their driver's licenses at airports starting in 2016. The Daily Herald reports the licenses don't meet requirements set by the 2005 Real ID Act that were meant to increase security. Illinois doesn't require a birth certificate to get a driver's license, which Illinois Secretary of State spokesman Henry Haupt said is one of the law's mandates. Haupt said state legislators would have to approve funding for changes to driver's license requirements. He said he's not sure how much it would cost, but the Secretary of State's office previously estimated...

The Federal Reserve is lashing out at Sen. Rand Paul’s plan to give Congress more oversight over the central bank, a proposal that could gain traction in the new Republican-led Congress. The Kentucky Republican reintroduced his “Audit the Fed” legislation last month with 30 co-sponsors, including other potential 2016 GOP hopefuls, Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas) and Marco Rubio (Fla.). [snip] On Wednesday, Cleveland Fed President Loretta Mester criticized the legislation as “misguided” during public remarks in Columbus, Ohio. “They really are about allowing political considerations to influence monetary policy decisions,” Mester said in her speech. “This would be a tremendous...

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Stock markets didn't react well to a tight-lipped statement from the Federal Reserve that gave no clear signal as to when it would begin to hike interest rates. January's meeting announcement came with no accompanying press conference, leaving investors to comb the wording for clues as to when a rate hike could occur. "From the equity market perspective, this might be the least helpful the Fed has been," said Brean Capital's Peter Tchir. "They didn't even find a way to work 'considerable' language into this." The S&P 500 closed 1.2% lower, and the Nasdaq dropped 0.73%....

Senators Rand Paul and Ted Cruz might end up running against each other for the Republican presidential nomination, but they can agree on one thing: their distrust of the Federal Reserve. On Wednesday, the two Republican senators introduced the Federal Reserve Transparency Act which Mr. Paul has been pushing for some time.Republicans have questioned the Fed’s moves to stimulate the economy since the financial crisis, arguing that the expansion of its balance sheet will create economic instability. In 2011, Gov. Rick Perry called the Fed’s monetary policies potentially “treasonous” and said that Ben S. Bernanke, the Fed chairman at the...

Fed’s $4 Trillion Holdings to Boost Growth Beyond End of QEQuantitative easing may turn out to be a gift that keeps on giving for the U.S. economy. As the Federal Reserve prepares to end its third round of bond buying next week, the central bank plans to hang on to the record$4.48 trillion balance sheet it has accumulated since announcing the first round of purchases in November 2008. That will continue to keep a lid on borrowing costs, helping the Fed lift inflation closer to its target and providing support to a five-year expansion facing headwinds abroad, from war in...

The NY Post tweeted that "Federal Reserve head Yellen announces bail-in in emergency meeting, rumored negative rate to be set at 4pm EST today," and US equity markets briefly started to rise... followed by a tweet that "The Fed would peg the Dollar to the Swiss Franc" and "Chinese anti-ship missile fired at USS George Washington." Both seemed odd and shortly after, The NY Post had deleted the tweets and explained that it had been hacked... The same tweets were also seen on the Twitter account of the wire service UPI.

Fed related publication warns of: http://www.frbsf.org/economic-research/publications/economic-letter/2014/december/baby-boomers-retirement-stocks-aging/