The Great Rate Hike Hoax – Ep. 116

* Here we go again; Janet Yellen was on Capitol Hill testifying about the banking system
* Forget about all her comments about how solvent the banking industry is - of course it's not
* The banking system is more vulnerable and more highly leveraged than before the bailout
* I am focusing on what she did or did not say about the Fed's intentions to raise rates in December and how the markets reacted
* Headlines following the testimony were about the probability that the Fed will raise rates in December
* The December meeting will be a live meeting with a rate hike on the table
* The official probability of a December rate hike rose from 50% to 60%
* When the Fed did not raise rates in October they removed language referencing concerns about international markets
* This was interpreted as a more hawkish stance on the part of the Fed
* The global economy was used as an excuse, but the Fed had no intention of raising rates in October
* In December when it doesn't raise rates, it'll use another excuse
* The markets wants to believe that the Fed will rates, and as soon as Yellen's comments were released, the dollar soared and gold tanked
* Let's look at what Janet Yellen actually said: first I am going to go to a Reuters story, Fed's Yellen sees possible December rate rise
* That's all it takes, just the mention of a possibility makes everybody jump to the conclusion it is going to happen
* Here's Yellen's quote directly from the artice:
* "What the committee has been expecting is that the economy will continue to grow at a pace that is sufficient to generate further improvements in the labor market and to return inflation to our 2 percent target over the medium term,"
* "If the incoming information supports that expectation then our statement indicates that December would be a live possibility."
* She is saying, if we get the improved data we're expecting
* The labor market has been weakening and the last two jobs numbers have been quite weak
* Yellen says it is possible if we get improvements we expect we will raise rates
* Anything is possible... it is more probable that she is not going to raise rates in December
* She actually says it's a long shot
* She's been saying this all year and it has not meant anything
* Reuters omitted from the article that Yellen followed up the above statement by reiterating that at this point, the Fed still has not made up its mind
* Another story from CNBC:Janet Yellen: December rate hike a 'live possibility'
* Here's a Yellen quote from this article:
* "Now no decision has been made on that and, what it will depend on, is the [Federal Open Market Committee's] assessment at the time. That assessment will be informed by all of the data that we collect between now and then,"
* This implies that they intend to collect data from now until the December meeting and make their decision on that data
* If the Fed does not know now, how different can the data be?
* If nothing is going to change, why not make a decision?
* Yellen's monetary policy is to pretend to raise rates and then not do it
* If you actually listen to what she is saying, it is far more probable that she won't raise rates, because thus far, we have not seen an improvement in the data she is tracking
* Even if the Fed sees improvements, they still might not raise rates
* Here's the one thing that Yellen is not doing: she does nothing to alter the false perception that a rate hike is likely
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