FOMC Preview

May 4, 2022

Not  much could have been said by officials in the seven weeks since the first FOMC hike to prepare markets for a doubling of the rate hike increment to 50 basis points. This will be the first hike of a half percentage point since May 2000. With that prospect in mind, the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield has climbed 79 basis points, and the dollar has risen 9.5% against the yen and 4.1% relative to the euro. The SPX and DJIA have lost 3.5% and 2.8%, while the tech-laden Nasdaq has declined by roughly 8%. The war in Ukraine was only three weeks old when the FOMC last met, and its inflationary implications are even more apparent now than then particularly in light of an intervening 11.1% additional rise in the price of West Texas Intermediate crude oil.

The notion that the Fed might raise interest rates by more than 25 basis points was a minority view prior to the March meeting, but investors learned than that St. Louis Fed President Bullard wanted to do 50 basis points even then. The more appropriate question now is whether rate hike increments of more than 50 basis points might be necessary. Examples of such, such as a 75-basis point increase in November 1994 or a full percentage point rise of the discount rate in November 1978, have been few. But inflation of 6.6% as measured by the Fed-favored PCE price deflator is the highest since at least 1959, and CPI inflation of 8.5% is the most since December 1981. Unless evidence emerges soon of a tipping point in inflation with reasons to strongly believe that a return to in-target inflation is highly likely, I think that the Fed’s interest rate will have to go significantly higher than discounted in the market and that moves even greater than 50 basis points will be used down the road.

Another topic of interest at Chairman Powell’s press conference will be the speed of Fed balance sheet reduction. Powell hinted that more information will be known by today meeting and insinuated that the balance sheet reduction would likely proceed more rapidly this time than when such was done last decade.

EUR/$ $/JPY 10Y, % DJIA Oil, $
06/30/04 1.2173 109.44 4.63 10396 37.95
06/30/05 1.2090 110.89 3.96 10370 57.00
06/29/06 1.2527 116.07 5.20 11077 73.41
06/28/07 1.3452 123.17 5.10 13456 69.82
08/07/07 1.3749 118.55 4.73 13510 72.27
09/18/07 1.3888 115.75 4.51 13475 81.42
10/31/07 1.4458 115.28 4.42 13873 93.59
12/11/07 1.4682 111.49 4.11 13645 89.78
01/30/08 1.4792 107.31 3.70 12454 91.70
03/18/08 1.5786 98.73 3.41 12257 107.53
04/30/08 1.5562 104.58 3.83 12953 111.54
06/25/08 1.5568 108.37 4.18 11837 133.62
08/05/08 1.5445 108.42 3.97 11484 119.82
09/16/08 1.4144 105.16 3.36 10936 91.18
10/08/08 1.3625 99.87 3.50 9447 87.02
10/29/08 1.2933 97.15 3.81 9145 67.38
12/16/08 1.3790 90.14 2.52 8687 44.14
01/28/09 1.3253 90.01 2.61 8356 42.92
03/18/09 1.3115 98.13 2.94 7340 47.73
04/29/09 1.3331 97.06 3.02 8194 51.05
06/24/09 1.3984 95.43 3.59 8373 68.76
08/12/09 1.4221 96.17 3.71 9366 70.64
09/23/09 1.4779 91.50 3.50 9859 69.13
11/04/09 1.4884 90.75 3.51 9896 80.66
12/16/09 1.4542 89.78 3.56 10478 73.14
01/27/10 1.4045 89.49 3.61 10148 73.31
03/16/10 1.3756 90.64 3.67 10645 81.45
04/28/10 1.3157 94.10 3.75 11043 82.57
06/23/10 1.2284 90.12 3.13 10307 76.50
08/10/10 1.3107 85.85 2.81 10605 79.94
09/21/10 1.3132 85.21 2.66 10747 73.05
11/03/10 1.4059 81.35 2.53 11174 84.59
12/14/10 1.3423 83.37 3.38 11497 88.47
01/26/11 1.3658 82.55 3.41 12001 87.36
03/15/11 1.3969 81.04 3.29 11815 98.09
04/27/11 1.4665 82.63 3.36 12612 112.48
06/22/11 1.4392 80.12 2.97 12175 94.87
08/09/11 1.4234 77.09 2.36 10993 81.76
09/21/11 1.3778 76.34 1.93 11377 86.74
11/02/11 1.3724 78.11 2.03 11805 92.77
12/13/11 1.3067 77.92 1.98 12130 100.20
01/25/12 1.3027 77.96 1.97 12670 98.85
03/13/12 1.3096 82.76 2.08 13044 106.34
04/25/12 1.3226 81.37 1.97 13096 104.13
06/20/12 1.2693 79.28 1.66 12837 83.63
08/01/12 1.2300 78.10 1.49 13028 88.98
09/13/12 1.2895 77.43 1.72 13342 97.60
10/24/12 1.2948 79.75 1.77 13115 85.72
12/12/12 1.3082 83.24 1.70 13325 87.13
01/30/13 1.3584 91.16 2.02 13949 97.63
03/20/13 1.2948 95.65 1.94 14497 92.82
05/01/13 1.3195 97.48 1.62 14740 90.47
06/19/13 1.3364 95.76 2.23 15304 98.38
07/31/13 1.3301 97.92 2.67 15565 105.63
09/18/13 1.3363 98.28 2.76 15606 107.01
10/30/13 1.3764 98.18 2.48 15660 97.42
12/18/13 1.3696 103.81 2.89 16198 98.06
01/29/14 1.3651 102.13 2.73 15719 97.23
03/19/14 1.3918 101.75 2.71 16335 99.96
04/30/14 1.3868 102.11 2.66 16553 99.52
06/18/14 1.3584 101.93 2.61 16892 106.12
07/30/14 1.3372 102.84 2.51 16878 101.45
08/17/14 1.2961 107.60 2.57 17151 94.05
10/29/14 1.2677 108.40 2.33 16956 82.51
12/17/14 1.2409 117.58 2.11 17201 57.85
01/28/15 1.1337 117.77 1.78 17457 44.75
03/18/15 1.0637 120.98 2.05 17733 42.49
04/29/15 1.1164 118.67 2.05 18039 59.16
06/17/15 1.1255 124.22 2.39 17862 59.12
07/29/15 1.1073 123.61 2.29 17720 49.17
09/17/15

10/28/15

 1.1334

1.1081

 120.86

120.50

 2.26

2.07

 16778

17687

 47.01

45.83
12/16/15

01/27/16

03/16/16

04/27/16

06/14/16

07/27/16

09/21/16

11/02/16

12/14/16

02/01/17

03/15/17

05/03/17

06/14/17

07/25/17

09/20/17

11/01/17

12/13/17

01/31/18

03/21/18

05/02/18

06/13/18

08/01/18

09/26/18

11/08/18

12/19/18

01/30/19

03/20/19

05/01/19

06/19/19

07/31/19

09/18/19

10/30/19

12/11/19

01/29/20

03/03/20

03/15/20

03/23/20

04/29/20

06/10/20

07/29/20

09/16/20

11/05/20

12/16/20

01/27/21

03/17/21

04/28/21

06/16/21

07/28/21

09/22/21

11/03/21

12/15/21

01/26/22

03/16/22

05/04/22

 1.0956

1.0874

1.1089

1.1339

1.1205

1.0998

1.1160

1.1099

1.0641

1.0741

1.0638

1.0910

1.1149

1.1735

1.2010

1.1631

1.1815

1.2424

1.2271

1.1963

1.1788

1.1668

1.1765

1.1400

1.1420

1.1415

1.1355

1.1244

1.1217

1.1132

1.1066

1.1117

1.1112

1.1002

1.1179

1.1087

1.0697

1.0859

1.1367

1.1787

1.1824

1.1814

1.2174

1.2115

1.1908

1.2071

1.2126

1.1812

1.1722

1.1581

1.1255

1.1287

1.0983

1.0552

 121.72

118.48

113.70

111.37

106.15

105.65

100.84

103.33

115.37

113.52

114.48

112.47

111.55

111.17

111.34

113.91

112.58

109.31

106.27

109.91

110.38

111.69

112.94

113.88

112.26

109.55

111.42

111.17

108.36

108.59

108.16

108.89

108.62

109.14

107.21

108.33

111.26

106.73

107.24

104.84

105.00

103.68

103.65

104.07

109.27

108.80

109.97

110.09

109.23

114.01

113.98

114.36

118.62

129.92

 2.29

2.02

1.99

1.89

1.62

1.53

1.70

1.78

2.45

2.49

2.57

2.30

2.13

2.29

2.24

2.35

2.34

2.73

2.89

2.97

2.96

2.99

3.08

3.23

2.81

2.72

2.57

2.48

2.08

2.02

1.75

1.80

1.80

1.61

1.01

1.01

0.81

0.61

0.77

0.59

0.67

0.77

0.91

1.01

1.66

1.62

1.49

1.25

1.31

1.56

1.45

1.78

2.19

2.98

 17583

16002

17217

18013

17675

18461

18151

17989

19915

19890

20885

20920

21375

21711

22376

23405

24585

26259

24839

24095

25309

25310

26543

26195

23881

24841

25727

26624

26452

27210

27048

27067

27877

28833

25917

23185

18592

24667

27169

26467

28196

28418

30,125

30,554

32,868

33,908

34,251

34,938

34,279

35,894

35,493

34,594

33,726

33,108

 35.95

30.85

37.79

44.89

48.29

41.91

43.44

45.18

51.83

53.33

48.43

47.96

44.71

48.75

50.55

54.24

56.60

64.41

65.00

67.57

66.77

67.62

71.68

60.93

47.80

54.51

59.48

63.38

53.65

58.48

58.16

54.60

58.68

53.52

47.18

31.73

23.36

15.30

39.05

41.22

40.00

38.84

47.77

52.81

64.30

63.70

72.32

74.25

71.94

81.14

70.39

87.40

95.70

106.34

Copyright 2022, Larry Greenberg. All rights reserved. No secondary distribution without express permission. 

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