Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic said yesterday, “we are well on the road to substantial progress toward our goal”, and July’s 943k job growth was “definitely quite encouraging in that regard.”
“My sense is if we are able to continue this for the next month or two I think we would have made the ‘substantial progress’ toward the goal and should be thinking about what our new policy position should be,” he said.
“Right now I’m thinking in the October-to-December range, but if the number comes back big” as with the last report “or maybe even a little bigger, I’d be open to moving it forward,” Bostic said. “If the number really explodes, I think we would have to consider that.”
Also, he said he favored a “balanced” approach on tapering both the MBS and treasuries purchases at the same fate, and “going relatively fast”. “The economy is in a much different place today” and “I am pretty confident these markets are going to continue to function even with a more rapid withdrawal, and I would be willing to lean into that to try to get us to complete the taper in a shorter period than what we have done in previous rounds.”
