One week after Politico reported for the second time that Trump, and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, were leaning toward Fed governor Jerome Powell for Fed Chair, Politico’s Ben White and Josh Dawsey decided to triple down, and with minutes left until the close, Politico reported – for the third time in three weeks – that “Powell is the leading candidate to become the chair of the U.S. central bank after President Donald Trump concluded a series of meetings with five finalists Thursday, three administration officials said.“
Repeating what it Politico said on two previous occasions (which is fine, algos and millennial traders these days have short memories), the authors repeated that “Trump hasn’t yet made a final decision” and that “Powell, known as Jay, has been heavily favored by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who is leading the Fed chair search for Trump.”
As for the other candidates, Politico had this to say:
Some Republicans are opposed to Yellen’s renomination because of her strong support of post-crisis financial rules and because she has moved only gradually to pull back the Fed’s stimulus of the economy.
Warsh has faced backlash from the left for being particularly concerned with the prospects for inflation heading into the financial crisis, and both he and Taylor are seen as monetary policy hawks, who might raise rates faster — at the expense of new jobs for those still on the sidelines of the workforce, Democrats worry.
And Cohn is a former Goldman Sachs president who is tied to the administration’s efforts to ease financial regulations.
What is amusing is that whereas recent news from either WSJ or Bloomberg that Trump was leaning toward Warsh of Taylor pushed stocks higher, the report that Trump was leaning toward the biggest possible dove in the group was an even stronger buy signal, as we commented moments ago:
Hawkish Fed Chair is bullish
Dovish Fed chair is bullisher— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 19, 2017
And sure enough, the market reacted as if stung on the BBG headline, which coming in seconds before the close, was sufficient to send the S&P back into the green after suffering their biggest drop in nearly 2 months this morning, and slamming the VIX deep in the red.
As for the online betting markets, Powell is now what is called a “done deal.”
via http://ift.tt/2xRND2F Tyler Durden