Live data from Hacker News

Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

pbs.org

51–60 of 262 posts

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#51
post #48

Is there anything preventing banks from buying treasures on open market by using funds they got from Fed by exchanging their treasuries on mark-to-maturity basis? Looks like a bailout with extra steps.

Can you explain the steps that you're thinking and explain why they would matter at this scale?

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#52
post #45
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a loan whose collateral is taken at par value rather than market price, which essentially increase the Fed's balance sheet. As of Wednesday last week, 4 months of QT have been reverted in a single week: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WALCL

As long as the regular Joe doesn’t get extra money to spend, inflation will be check. Banks won’t go buy eggs anytime soon. We had close to 0% interest rates for almost a decade, and inflation was in check. It’s not the Fed that caused inflation, it is: * Suspending school debt (extra income) * Injecting real cash into the economy (stimulus checks and PPP loans to small businesses) * Supply chain bottlenecks after Co…

I don’t really understand the inflation situation. When house prices shot up, heath care costs shot up, education costs shot up there was no inflation. But when the little guys got some money, suddenly we call it inflation. I don’t really get it.

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#53
post #26

So here's what I'm confused by. The writing was on the wall a year ago for rapid interest rate hikes. This has well-known and predictable effects on long-term bond holdings. Why didn't banks liquidate their long-term bond holdings a year ago? I can guess the answer: they wanted to protect executive bonuses and share prices. They hoped they could just stick their heads in the sands and hold those bonds to maturity. An…

> Why didn't banks liquidate their long-term bond holdings a year ago?

Because these bonds are in the Hold-to-maturity portfolio and you can't sell them. If you sell one you have to mark down everything.

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#54

Why are we even doing the dance that banks need to keep short term assets on hand to satisfy deposit outflow? Can't they just buy whatever government bonds they want (if the federal government defaults and does not honor its debt there are bigger issues than some regional bank) and give them to the Fed in exchange for freshly minted money? It's the end result in either case, but a lot of uncertainty and friction is a…

Banks lend money to the US government so that a different branch of government can loan the money again to the banks? The whole thing sounds like a charade

By having banks buy government bonds and/or lend money to the government, they are essentially investing in the stability of the government itself. This can help build confidence in the government and the banking sector, which can contribute to overall stability. Of course, there are still real risks and challenges that exist, such as potential default by the government or problems within the banking system.

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#55
post #45
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a loan whose collateral is taken at par value rather than market price, which essentially increase the Fed's balance sheet. As of Wednesday last week, 4 months of QT have been reverted in a single week: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WALCL

As long as the regular Joe doesn’t get extra money to spend, inflation will be check. Banks won’t go buy eggs anytime soon. We had close to 0% interest rates for almost a decade, and inflation was in check. It’s not the Fed that caused inflation, it is: * Suspending school debt (extra income) * Injecting real cash into the economy (stimulus checks and PPP loans to small businesses) * Supply chain bottlenecks after Co…

Inflation was there all along in asset prices - why else have home values gone up disproportionately relative to average Joe's income?

What the Fed is doing with this move is patching the balloon and preventing a deflation. That is, bank has a run on deposits because people want their money back; bank is out of liquid cash; bank sells bonds/MBS that have mark-to-market less than par thus realizing losses.

The downstream consequence that we didn't see with SVB was the bank starting to call unsecured loans, and pull back on lines of credit etc. Which should in turn have triggered the turning in of the leased Lambos and Audis....

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#56
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a loan whose collateral is taken at par value rather than market price, which essentially increase the Fed's balance sheet. As of Wednesday last week, 4 months of QT have been reverted in a single week: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WALCL

It's a loan that will be paid back within 90 days. Most for the money won't enter circulation and is only a liquidity backstop for banks. The rest of the money will be gone in a few months. This is extremely different from traditional QE which involves buying long dated bonds.

True, I'm just not sure what's the plan after these 90 days have passed other than more loans, any idea? If the Fed suddenly cut rate aggressively that would be one way for banks to restore liquidity but I cannot see that happening while inflation still running hot.

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#57
post #48

Is there anything preventing banks from buying treasures on open market by using funds they got from Fed by exchanging their treasuries on mark-to-maturity basis? Looks like a bailout with extra steps.

The interest rate on the loans is .1% higher than the 3 month T bills which is all they can get before the loan comes due. They would lose money with this strategy.

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#59
post #3

This is another QE/Quantitative Easing, even if they don't call it that way. I hope inflation doesn't come back/get higher again because then we'd likely see the kind of second wave inflation people saw in the 70s.

Agree it's QE. For those that say this isn't QE, it's understandable given the "original sin of QE" as Ricardo Reis put it: https://twitter.com/R2Rsquared/status/1576164361898708998?t=... (this episode is QE type 3 in his taxonomy)

This is like the whole debate over whether or not there was a bailout. In the colloquial sense there absolutely was. In the traditional policy definition it really wasn't. It may seem academic but if you're interested in how this will affect the taxpayer then it makes a big difference. Both the Fed and FDIC are exercising the tools within their ordinary powers.

Re: Federal Reserve lent $300B in emergency funds to banks in the past week

#60
post #3

This is another QE/Quantitative Easing, even if they don't call it that way. I hope inflation doesn't come back/get higher again because then we'd likely see the kind of second wave inflation people saw in the 70s.

It’s a loan, not QE. QE is no strings attached money injected into the market. QT is still ongoing as of last week, however, I don’t see it lasting. I do think a .25 rate hike will still happen.

There may be strings attached but it's still a massive loan that inflates the money supply.
Post reply on HN