Thursday, February 21, 2013

The Currencies the Federal Reserve Might Mess With


The latest minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee reports that the
The Federal Open Market Committee authorizes and directs the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, for the System Open Market Account, to the extent necessary to carry out the Committee's foreign currency directive and express authorizations by the Committee pursuant thereto, and in conformity with such procedural instructions as the Committee may issue from time to time:
And then lists these currencies:

Australian dollars
Brazilian reais
Canadian dollars
Danish kroner
euro
Japanese yen
Korean won
Mexican pesos
New Zealand dollars
Norwegian kroner
Pounds sterling
Singapore dollars
Swedish kronor
Swiss francs

5 comments:

  1. Where's the subjunctive verb in that preamble? They authorize and direct to do what?
    Is it a typo? Or are they illiterate?

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    1. Nice pickup. When i read it the first time my brain subconsciously just inserted, authorizes "to do whatever we want".

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  2. "The Federal Open Market Committee authorizes and directs the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, for the System Open Market Account, to the extent necessary to carry out the Committee's foreign currency directive and express authorizations by the Committee pursuant thereto, and in conformity with such procedural instructions as the Committee may issue from time to time"
    Is this the normal sort of language that the Fed uses? no wonder nobody asked any questions of it for years.

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  3. here's the 'verb' -- To purchase and sell the following foreign currencies in the form of cable transfers through spot or forward transactions on the open market at home and abroad, including transactions with the U.S. Treasury, with the U.S. Exchange Stabilization Fund established by section 10 of the Gold Reserve Act of 1934, with foreign monetary authorities, with the Bank for International Settlements, and with other international financial institutions ...

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for the verb. It now makes more sense syntactically, if not economically.

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