Lots More on What Just Happened With the Fed at Jackson Hole

We're still at the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank's annual economic symposium in Jackson Hole, where we just heard Fed Chair Jerome Powell's big speech. The speech -- which opened the door to a September rate cut -- proved to be a dovish surprise to the market and stocks are now soaring because of it. But why did Powell decide to focus on what he sees as "downside" risks to the labor market as opposed to "upside" risks to inflation? On this episode, we speak to Bloomberg TV's Michael McKee, who's been to dozens of Jackson Hole meetings since the late 1990s. We talk with him about the speech, how Jackson Hole has changed over time, and who's in the running to replace Powell next year. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox — now delivered every weekday — plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlotsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• 2:13Tracy Alloway?

  Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio, news. How many Jackson Holes have you actually been to now?

• 2:21Speaker 04

  It's a little hard to say, but my first one was 1997.

• 2:25Tracy Alloway?

  Wow.

• 2:25Speaker 04

  I've missed a few here and there as breaking news has happened and I've had to be somewhere else. But so somewhere around 25 to 30.

• 2:32Tracy Alloway?

  So Joe, if we keep doing this for another 40 years, we'll, uh, we'll notch up as many Jackson holes as Mike has been to maybe.

• 2:39Speaker 04

  Now, if he does another 40 or two, we could never catch up.

• 2:42Tracy Alloway?

  If Mike stops now and we keep doing it until we're 80.

• 2:47Speaker 04

  Maybe we'll catch up.

• 2:50Joe Weisenthal?

  I did a deadlift.

• 2:51Tracy Alloway?

  I am both the most popular trader and most successful trader at Citadel.

• 2:56Joe Weisenthal?

  Fed is going viral.

• 2:57Tracy Alloway?

  Uh, barges.

• 2:58Joe Weisenthal?

  This is an after school special, except.

• 3:00Tracy Alloway?

  I've decided I'm going to base my entire personality going forward on campaigning for a strategic pork reserve in the U.S. Black gold. These are the important questions. Is it robots taking over the world?

• 3:10Joe Weisenthal?

  No, I think that like in a couple of years, the AI will do a really good job of making the odd lots podcast.

• 3:16Speaker 02

  One day that person will have the mandate of heaven.

• 3:19Tracy Alloway?

  How do I get more popular and successful?

• 3:22Joe Weisenthal?

  We do have. The perfect guest. Welcome to lots more where we catch up with friends about what's going on right now.

• 3:29Tracy Alloway?

  Because even when odd lots is over, there's always lots more.

• 3:34Joe Weisenthal?

  And we really do have the perfect guest.

• 3:39Speaker 04

  We are of course, talking to the one and only Mike McKee of Bloomberg TV. A little surprising speech today, huh? Yeah, I was wrong, as were the majority of analysts who thought that Jay Powell would want to leave his options open for September. Because as we've been repeating over and over again, there's another jobs report, there's another CPI report before the next meeting. And so what happens if we see a reversion to the mean? We had a weak jobs report. What if the next one comes in strong? We had inflation going through CPI at a low level. Does that pick up a lot? In which case you don't want to cut rates.

• 4:18Speaker 04

  So it was a bit of a surprise that he said, basically opened the door to a rate cut because now it's really hard to close that door. Tracy, have you read Anna Wong's ticket?

• 4:27Tracy Alloway?

  I have not.

• 4:28Joe Weisenthal?

  So she has a new piece out on the terminal which you should read. But she argues that's not so dovish. If you use the 2024 speech as the benchmark, which is true for sure. That was a more dovish speech. But what I think the vibe is that maybe the three of us have. It's certainly dovish in the context of a lot of people suddenly like, let's look at the inflation side again.

• 4:46Tracy Alloway?

  Well, this is exactly it. So Mike, I think you had the same experience as us, which is a lot of the people from the Fed that you've been talking to over the past couple of days. They sounded more hawkish than they did, you know, perhaps like just three or four weeks ago.

• 5:00Speaker 04

  Yeah, and I have to think that, or I have to caution myself to look at this as perhaps as a statistician would say, a selection error. Because we happened to hit people who were more hawkish. Obviously, the chairman basically validated Chris Waller's forecast that they've decided that inflation is going to go up, but it's going to go up slowly. It'll take a while to get into the economy. And sector by sector, it'll be a one-time price rise and not a continuing price increase.

• 5:31Joe Weisenthal?

  Setting aside the actual technical economic details of the speech itself. Were you surprised that there wasn't something more? I don't know if valedictory is the word, but you know, it's the last speech as the chairman. It comes at a time when we were all talking about the sort of threats to Federal Reserve independence. Were you surprised it was such a policy speech and not any sort of knowledge to some of these bigger things?

• 5:56Speaker 04

  I was not surprised by that. Powell is very self-effacing. He's not somebody who likes to toot his own horn. And we kind of knew going in that he didn't want to make a big deal of this being his last Jackson Hole as chair. The Fed independence thing was a bit of a surprise because it has been such a big issue. But I think, given the message he wanted to send to the markets about the policy going forward. Plus, he had the whole section on the new framework he had to discuss.

• 6:23Joe Weisenthal?

  Yeah.

• 6:24Speaker 04

  I think they felt it was just going to be too long, too much. And that would come up in many other fora to talk about.

• 6:32Tracy Alloway?

  It is funny, no one's talking about the framework. The results of like five years of work on the framework are published today and they're just lost in all the other stories.

• 6:40Speaker 04

  I have asked Fed officials about this. I said, why do you do this? Because. They came up with this new framework in 2020 that didn't work. And a year into it, Jay Powell said, well, we've junked the framework because we've got inflation. And so if you're going to go to all this work to create a framework and then as soon as the economy turns, you junk it, kind of what's the point? Their argument is that it gives them sort of a reference point of how they want to think about things. And today, really, they went back to 2012, which was, we'll do whatever the economy needs when it needs it.

• 7:14Joe Weisenthal?

  It's important to remember, it's interesting thinking about that 2020 framework because we're so, the existence of that framework is so 2010s, right? It's so like thinking about, well, the main problem of monetary policy is long periods of undershoots.

• 7:29Tracy Alloway?

  The zero bound.

• 7:30Joe Weisenthal?

  The zero bound, constantly under 2%. How are we going to credibly get it above? And then five minutes later, we have the worst inflation in 40 years. That was a real, that framework from 2020 was like, is an artifact of a time.

• 7:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, absolutely. And the Fed's new framework sort of takes into account the fact that that could happen again.

• 7:52Joe Weisenthal?

  Yeah.

• 7:53Speaker 04

  Because they're not using shortfall anymore in, in employment. But, and they've also dropped references to the zero lower bound. But they, basically, they're saying, we admit that we can't steer the economy in quite as precise a way as we thought we could because the underlying conditions that we're working off of can change faster than we anticipated.

• 8:16Tracy Alloway?

  I will just note, I know that Powell didn't speak about central bank independence directly, but there is at least one paper being presented at the conference that does deal with this issue by Emmy Nakamura from Berkeley. And we have a really good episode coming up with her. So there, there is some thematic discussion. It's just, we're not all hearing it because it's closed doors. Although, Mike, you get to go inside the conference, right?

• 8:41Joe Weisenthal?

  I get to go inside.

• 8:41Tracy Alloway?

  All right. So what's the vibe like in, in the room?

• 8:44Speaker 04

  Well, I hate to disappoint everybody, but it's rather quite boring unless, unless you're an academic economist, because these papers are written by academic economists and they're designed to look at longer term issues and try to put them in a context so that the central bankers can think about them. Okay, here's a problem that's come up. What's the research said about it in the past? That sort of thing. It's not a meeting where people come in and go, okay, here's unemployment and here's prices and what do we do at the next meeting?

• 9:11Joe Weisenthal?

  Yeah.

• 9:12Speaker 04

  That, that doesn't get discussed at all. Even the- Open market committee officials who are here, they're not going to be really talking about that because they talk about that all the time. They're here to fish and hike and enjoy the scenery along with these academic papers. So inside, it's an academic conference. They present the papers. They have a discussant who talks about the papers and then people can ask questions. And if you notice, you know, if you're watching your Bloomberg terminal, it's almost never a headline from inside because nobody says anything that would move markets or interest people, really.

• 9:44Joe Weisenthal?

  You know, other regional feds have their conferences. So, you know, there's a Boston Fed one in November. There's an Atlanta Fed one. I think it's somewhere in Florida at some point in the year. The only thing that's really special here is that, and Powell alluded to it, it's Jackson Hole in August. And anyone would be a fool to say no to coming there. And that's how they got Volcker to come because he liked fly fishing. Like This is why it exists. They could all show up at the other ones, but it's Jackson Hole in August.

• 10:12Speaker 04

  It's Jackson Hole.

• 10:13Joe Weisenthal?

  And as you mentioned, people are here to fly fish. I think that's actually an important element, even though it's just a fun element, which is that it's late summer. It's kind of like halfway between vacation and work out here for almost everyone.

• 10:24Speaker 04

  Another reason that it has become important, though, is starting with Ben Bernanke during the great financial crisis. He came and the chairman usually gave a speech to open the conference on the conference topic.

• 10:36Joe Weisenthal?

  Ah.

• 10:36Speaker 04

  And it was like, okay, we're talking about long-term labor issues. That's a really good thing to talk about and we're glad you're all here, kind of thing. Then he announced basically that they were going to do QE for the first time at this meeting. And then the next year, he also had announcement about QE, QT, and what they were going to do. And then all of a sudden, the focus became, what's the chairman going to say?

• 10:57Joe Weisenthal?

  This is a big, this is a big one.

• 10:59Speaker 04

  Because if, there's rarely a Fed meeting in August, just the way the calendar falls, maybe at the very beginning, and then there isn't one until September. So you have this long month where there's no reference point for the markets. And that, this became the reference point. So everybody pays attention to it. And as you know, it's a big buildup to it. Oh, we've got Jackson Hole next week. What's the chairman going to say? And so that's really focused a lot of attention on it, which then feeds on itself because it becomes important. So people want to be there because it is important.

• 11:30Tracy Alloway?

  This reminds me, there was an old study, it was done a few years ago, so I would love to see a new study, but it basically looked at all the FOMC statements and speeches over time. And starting from 2009, they exploded in both length and complexity. So I think it used to be, you could have like, you know, a high school reading level and be fine reading some of the FOMC statements, they were very short, like 400 words, and then they became like 2,000 words and you needed a college degree at a minimum to fully understand them. Talk to us about just like the format of the speech, because this is something else that people like to do is dissect like the number of words and things like that. And it is true, this is a longer speech this year versus the relatively short speech

• 12:15Tracy Alloway?

  from last year where Powell very definitively opened the door to a cut.

• 12:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, well, I think that what made this speech long was talking about the framework. It's, as we said, maybe somewhat irrelevant, but he had to go through it, they'd been doing this exercise, and it was anticipated he would announce it here. So basically, he went through it, we've now done the exercise, and now we've explained it to you, and so you'll understand going forward if we refer to this. So that made it longer. The part that was really kind of to the point was the stuff about the economy. He outlined what they were thinking about the labor market and what they were thinking about inflation, and then how those two knit together. If this had been an ordinary speech without the framework, it wouldn't have been as long.

• 13:04Speaker 04

  Maybe it would have come across as even more punchy because it was just on that subject. You were talking about the Fed's statements getting very long, the post-Great Financial Crisis years, and the Fed realized that at one point.

• 13:15Tracy Alloway?

  Oh yeah, that's right. They tried to calibrate.

• 13:17Speaker 04

  About two or three years ago, they've cut them back significantly. We used to have very long statements where they tried to explain every little thing, and people found that too much. So now they're just kind of saying, here's, we got one paragraph on where the economy is, and a paragraph that says, here's what we're doing about it.

• 13:31Joe Weisenthal?

  You know, another nice thing about Jackson Hole in late August is you don't just get, you know, just lure the Fed chair there, you lure central bankers all around the world. But I feel like in this moment... The Fed itself, the Fed is always first among equals. Most people would agree with that, but the Fed, because of all the dramas, like this black hole sucking up all the energy. It's your perception, you know, we saw the walk where Powell was with Lagarde and Bailey and Ueda, is your perception that all the developed markets, central banks are roughly wrestling with still the same thing? Because there's just been, there's been this global factor of the inflation and so forth. Are they all sort of basically feeling the same stresses?

• 14:12Speaker 04

  They are. We're still living in a post pandemic world, so data are somewhat difficult to read. And you see the ups and downs of the economies that you may or may not be able to track. But the biggest thing at the moment is that they are all wrestling with Trump fiscal policy. But the fiscal policy has different impacts on different countries. For the United States, it's inflationary. For many of the countries out there, it's deflationary because their currency is going down, the dollar is getting stronger. And so they have different problems they have to deal with. They all have a problem with the consequences of the Trump policy, but the consequences are different for each one.

• 14:50Tracy Alloway?

  Well, you were talking about this on TV earlier, because when it comes to tariffs, there is still a huge debate over how inflationary they might actually be. Because in traditional economics, you would view them as a tax, which tends to destroy demand and can lead to deflation. On the other hand, we have seen producer prices start to pick up. What have you learned about just how policymakers are actually viewing the impact of tariffs at this conference?

• 15:15Speaker 04

  Well, there has been division. We have the Chris Waller version, who went to the textbook and said tariffs are a one time increase in the price level. And then, since he first said that in July, what we've seen is the president delaying these tariffs. So they come on one by one, and that drags the process out. Now, what the chairman seemed to decide was that it's still going to be a one time increase, sector by sector. So it might drag out, but it's not going to be an ongoing process of each sector seeing prices rise. So the impacts, they, they have a hard time judging because it's not like you pass Smoot Hawley, and on a certain day it takes effect, and you see the immediate price impact.

• 15:58Tracy Alloway?

  Right.

• 15:58Speaker 04

  And then you can measure what's happening and what's it's going to do. Here, they have to take into account each sector, whether the exporter absorbs any of it. Whether the importer absorbs any of it, what companies do in terms of pricing? Do they take some out of their margins because they don't want to lose market share? Or do they just pass it along to people? These are all complex questions. And as one of the Fed economists said to me, each one affects another. So because so much of this stuff is intermediate goods that are used to price something else. So it gets very complicated. So it is hard for them to know exactly how this is going to play out.

• 16:35Joe Weisenthal?

  Tracy, I have a take.

• 16:36Tracy Alloway?

  Oh, oh, do you?

• 16:38Joe Weisenthal?

  I have a take.

• 16:38Tracy Alloway?

  What a surprise. All right, go ahead.

• 16:40Joe Weisenthal?

  I was thinking about this when we were on air is maybe the answer is that tariffs are a one off in terms of the inflationary impulse, but that the underlying political impulse to impose tariffs, this desire for everyone to have all their stuff and protect their home countries, industries and so forth, is going to be this new permanent feature that is not a one off.

• 17:01Tracy Alloway?

  Would that feature be inflationary?

• 17:03Joe Weisenthal?

  And if that is sustained, then maybe it is.

• 17:05Tracy Alloway?

  Yeah. I mean, there is an irony here, which is the Trump administration has long criticized paperwork and government bureaucracy and things like that. And I cannot even imagine how much time companies are spending trying to figure out tariffs right now and doing customs documentation and stuff like that. Okay, Mike, next year, we're going to have a new Fed chair, new vibes at Jackson Hole, potentially. Who are you watching out for?

• 17:32Speaker 04

  Right now, I'm still watching out for the original Trump list that Kevin's has it in Warrsh and for Chris Waller. You could argue that the speech today improved Waller's chances if you were looking at it from a Las Vegas point of view in terms of odds, because he was right.

• 17:49Tracy Alloway?

  Right.

• 17:50Speaker 04

  At least, at least the Fed is saying he was right. But this is Donald Trump, so we have no idea. I think most of the people who've been sort of added on in the talking about stage in terms of the list are more red herrings. Some of them are obviously not going to be the chair. But what he's been able to do is get more people on TV. Getting interviewed about, are you going to be the chair? And they're all saying, well, we need to cut rates. You're not on the list if you're not going to cut rates. So are they really serious candidates? And Scott Vessin says, OK, I got 11 people I'm going to bring in. The president keeps saying, I got three people I'm going to choose from. So I think you go back to the original list. He's comfortable with those people. They all look like they could be Fed chairs.

• 18:33Speaker 04

  And we know the impression that the person makes is important. So they're the most likely ones to choose from. I'm not saying he couldn't surprise. He surprises in almost everything he does.

• 18:45Tracy Alloway?

  Have you interacted with Waller before? I've never met him, so.

• 18:47Speaker 04

  Oh, I know Chris quite well. The one thing about Chris is we've extrapolated the Lisa Cook thing to if the president got four people on the board, then they can fire all the bank presidents, et cetera, et cetera. And he'd have all this control. I don't think Waller would go along with that. He's in favor of lower interest rates. He has his own ideas about the economy, but he's a very smart economist. And you could defend what he says, even if you don't necessarily agree with it. But he's an institutionalist. He's somebody who follows what the Fed has done in the past. And I don't think he would give in to the president's desire to do something that would hurt the Fed, hurt its credibility, hurt its ability to do its job.

• 19:30Joe Weisenthal?

  Tracy, it's 2025. I think David Zirvis looks like a Fed chair.

• 19:35Tracy Alloway?

  OK, I'm going to go fly fishing. I'm going to do what I'm supposed to do at Jackson Hole and go fish.

• 19:39Joe Weisenthal?

  Let's go.

• 19:44Tracy Alloway?

  Lots More is produced by Carmen Rodriguez and Dashil Bennett with help from Moses Ondom and Kale Brooks.

• 19:50Joe Weisenthal?

  Our sound engineer is Blake Maples. Sage Baum is the head of Bloomberg Podcasts.

• 19:55Tracy Alloway?

  Please rate, review, and subscribe to Odd Lots and Lots More on your favorite podcast platforms.

• 20:01Joe Weisenthal?

  And remember that Bloomberg subscribers can listen to all of our podcasts ad free by connecting through Apple Podcasts. Thanks for listening.

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