Powell and his fellow tough guys at the Fed had increased rates to 5.3% and have talked tough about keeping rates up until inflation got back to their 2% target. With GDP supposedly accelerating at 5.2%, unemployment still near all-time lows, and corporate profits still booming, there should be no fear about rates being too high by Powell and his sycophants. But suddenly this week Powell and these economic “rocket scientists” now are saying they will be cutting rates soon and more than anyone expected.
The stock market exploded to all-time highs and interest rates plummeted. This seems odd, when more than half the country is struggling to put food on the table. It’s almost as if Powell and his pals know something really bad is about to happen and want to front run the event, or, like September 2019, they see something terribly wrong within the financial system and are trying to fix it before it blows up. We do know the Too Big To Trust Wall Street banks have close to $700 billion of unrealized losses on their books due to interest rates hitting 16 year highs. We also know these banks have been increasingly utilizing the Fed’s emergency facility every day.
All it would take is some sort of emergency, whether global crisis, natural disaster crisis, or war breaking out between global powers, to start a run on the banks. If that were to happen, those unrealized losses would become realized, and the entire financial system would begin to collapse. Is that why Powell and the Fed are now desperate to drive interest rates lower, in order to eliminate those unrealized losses before they become realized? Whatever the reason, they are trapped. Drastically lowering interest rates will just reignite inflation again. It looks like Powell has chosen inflation rather than deflation as we spiral into the abyss. Enjoy the show and buy more ammo.