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WASHINGTON -The door at the notoriously secretive Federal Reserve is opening wider.
For the first time in the Fed's 98-year history, its chairman is to begin holding regular news conferences. For Ben Bernanke, Wednesday's meeting with the press gives him a chance to steer the debate about where hiring, economic growth and inflation are headed in the months ahead.
It also helps the chairman cast himself as open and accessible, eager to answer questions.
Investors will be looking mainly for clues about when the Fed will reverse course and begin boosting interest rates.
When their two-day meeting ends Wednesday, before the news conference begins, Bernanke and his colleagues are expected to signal that the Fed's $600 billion Treasury bond-buying program will end as scheduled in June.
The bond-buying program was intended to keep interest rates low, encourage spending and boost growth. But critics say increased spending has raised the risk of high inflation.
Since the Fed announced the economic-support program in November, the economy has improved. Unemployment has fallen to 8.8 percent. And the private sector over the past two months has embarked on its biggest hiring spree in five years.
But a spike in oil and food prices has pushed inflation up. That's sparked a debate within the Fed about when to start raising rates and take other steps to soak up the money pumped into the economy during the recession.
A vocal minority, including the Fed regional chiefs in Philadelphia and Minneapolis, say the Fed may need to raise interest rates by the end of this year to fight inflation. The central bank has kept its benchmark interest rate near zero since December 2008.
See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/lbYh2s
For the first time in the Fed's 98-year history, its chairman is to begin holding regular news conferences. For Ben Bernanke, Wednesday's meeting with the press gives him a chance to steer the debate about where hiring, economic growth and inflation are headed in the months ahead.
It also helps the chairman cast himself as open and accessible, eager to answer questions.
Investors will be looking mainly for clues about when the Fed will reverse course and begin boosting interest rates.
When their two-day meeting ends Wednesday, before the news conference begins, Bernanke and his colleagues are expected to signal that the Fed's $600 billion Treasury bond-buying program will end as scheduled in June.
The bond-buying program was intended to keep interest rates low, encourage spending and boost growth. But critics say increased spending has raised the risk of high inflation.
Since the Fed announced the economic-support program in November, the economy has improved. Unemployment has fallen to 8.8 percent. And the private sector over the past two months has embarked on its biggest hiring spree in five years.
But a spike in oil and food prices has pushed inflation up. That's sparked a debate within the Fed about when to start raising rates and take other steps to soak up the money pumped into the economy during the recession.
A vocal minority, including the Fed regional chiefs in Philadelphia and Minneapolis, say the Fed may need to raise interest rates by the end of this year to fight inflation. The central bank has kept its benchmark interest rate near zero since December 2008.
See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/lbYh2s
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