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Economy

FOMC Minutes Diagnosis: Mass Schizophrenia

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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Bernanke_imageWe just got the full comments from the August 5 FOMC meeting.  The FOMC sees continued downside to growth with a damped economy lasting several quarters.  Members continue to believe that the next rate direction is for higher rates, but the timing still appears uncertain (most likely meaning after the election).  Officials see lower GDP in the second half of 2008 and in 2009.  The staff sees inflation high in 2008 and slowing in 2009; but there is some division on what the actual bias of the Fed looks like.  Here is a link to the full prepared minutes with the exact numbers and exact comments. What is ever-obvious is that the FOMC really can’t figure out if it is Jeckyl or Hyde.  It wants to fight inflation and can’t lower rates, but the economic data is still getting weaker and the unofficial recession hasn’t even gone official. 

Jon C. Ogg
August 26, 2008

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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