FED: Considering Three Options for next Easing

As reported by Wall Street Journal’s ace Fed reporter, Jon Hilsenrath, the Federal Reserve is considering three options for it September 20 – 21 meeting’s next round of easing. They are the following:

1. The “Operation Twitst” wherein they will extend the duration of the Fed’s bond portfolio by selling the short-end, and purchasing more long-dated bonds. That way, the end of the curve would push lower.

2. Reduce the interest on excess reserves that banks hold with the Fed, so that they can hold fewer reserves and lend more money.

3. Fed will use a clearer language to emphasize that they will hold very low rates for a long time.

For further details, visit Jon Hilsenrath’s WSJ article.

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Anonymous Group of Hackers’ Next Target, U.S. Federal Reserve

The Federal Reserve Web site is in trouble of shutting down as the Anonymous hacker group declare that they will be targeting the said site if Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke refuse to step down on his position.

Using a distributed denial of service(DDoS) attack that was designed to shut down a Web site, the Anonymous groups had shut down several government and company websites. Some of the site that they had attack are Spanishe national police site, Turkish government site and even Sony which is the best known operation of the group.

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Asian Markets down, Following Wall Street

Mixed US corporate earnings sent Asian economy lower last Tuesday, as traders waited for Federal Reserve’s updated insight on US economy. Japan’s Nikkei 225 index was down to 1.1%, while investors unload blue chip shares prior to the expected earning season. Moreover, South Korea’s Kospi dropped to 0.6%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng decreased to 1.1%. In addition to this, Mainland China’s Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.9%. Benchmarks in Taiwan, Philippines, Singapore and Indonesia were also depleted.

Furthermore, the Asian Development Bank says that world food prices surged by over 30% during the first two months of this year. A Manila-based lender reported last Tuesday that food inflation in many Asian economies has averaged 10% early this year, and this may continue due to global oil price hikes, production shortfalls caused by bad weather, and export restrictions. That said, this is a serious drawback for a region that has rapidly rebounded from the global economic crisis.

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