Barr: The Case for Strong, Effective Banking Supervision

Thank you for that kind introduction. I thought I would share my sense of the economy today and where it may be headed. These are my thoughts only and not those of anyone else on the Federal Open Market Committee or in the Federal Reserve System. I hope you will give me some grace as we have been operating with limited government data for almost seven weeks. I like analogies, so I’ve been describing operating with limited data as trying to bring a boat to shore in the pitch black and having the lighthouse go dark. You can assume you’re on the same course for a short while. You can try to navigate by lantern. But you can’t ignore the fact that you don’t have much visibility, you might lose your bearings and there may be hazards up ahead. The good news is that we aren’t navigating blind. We have other ways to keep a pulse on the economy. Private sector data help. For the most part, they aren't as definitive nor as calibrated, but they can highlight big shifts in economic conditions. In addition, the Fed benefits from collecting real-time information directly from the communities we serve. The Richmond Fed set up our extensive outreach efforts because we recognized that even government data has its drawbacks. It’s backward-looking. It’s revised multiple times. It’s aggregated, so it often doesn’t capture underlying nuance. To address these gaps, each year my outreach team connects with thousands of business and community leaders; this year, we are on track to meet with about 4,000. We get thousands more responses through our regional surveys of business activity, as well as The CFO Survey. This outreach helps us understand the economy better, as well as anticipate turning points we might otherwise miss. In 2020, businesses in Bristol told us of packed shopping malls across the Tennessee border where shutdown rules had lifted; pent-up demand was coming. In 2022, furniture manufacturers told us sales were slowing; the goods boom was cooling. In 2023, firms told us they’d keep testing price increases; pricing psychology had shifted from “no chance” before COVID-19 to “no crime in trying.” RICHMOND FED'S BARKIN/SHENANDOAH U: 'A LOT TO LEARN' BEFORE DEC FOMC; 'WILL WANT TO THROTTLE BACK UNTIL YOU GET MORE VISIBILITY' #Barkin #FederalReserve #economy Fed's Barkin: Inflation is above target, but it's not likely to accelerate. Fed's Barkin: The labor market is softening, but I don't think it will soften that much more. BARKIN SAYS POLICY IS STILL MODESTLY RESTRICTIVE