A more public Federal Reserve

Hello everyone,

This post is in line with ye old economic recovery model of: for an end to the crisis to occur the institutions that got us here have to change, the people at those institutions have to change, and their ideas have to change. Specifically I wanted to highlight for each of you the fact that the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, has vowed to make the proceedings of the Federal Reserve more public. This is a good thing.

Previously, the Fed was so Byzantine in its secrecy that entire legions of Wall Street analysts had been employed as Fed “tea leaf” readers to anticipate the Federal Reserve Board’s prospective actions. Some of this analysis included assessments of the personalities and predilections of the individual Board membership so that a fuller understanding of predictions could be had. If the Fed becomes more public then some of this soft-science can be minimized. Amen!

One item that they are considering is holding regular public press conferences. Additional “openness” steps are being considered. For me, all of this is a positive sign of both important change already being underway, as well as a positive sign of increased empowerment of individual investors. Hip-hip-hurray!

I will keep you all apprised of any other developments.

Jason