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October
23
2020

The Hazards of an “Endless Fed”
Birch Gold Group

The Federal Reserve’s balance sheet has been soaring in 2020. In March, it was “only” $4.67 trillion; today, it’s approaching $7 trillion.

That development alone can be pretty unnerving. But what may be of even moreconcern is the growing amount of Fed treasury holdings.

It’s an amount so large that, at approximately $4.5 trillion, the bond market might require endless intervention from the central bank to continue functioning.

You can see the Fed’s total treasury holdings in the chart below:

Even more, the amount of debt held by the public has shot through the economic roof, growing about $3 trillion in 2020 alone. A recent piece on Yahoo provides greater context:

America’s debt pile has exploded to more than $20 trillion, from roughly $13 trillion five years ago, and the economic fallout from the pandemic means it is set to expand even more.

The total amount of public debt currently sits around $26 trillion (see official chart below):

These developments are causing many to consider the potential for an “Endless Fed”. That includes officials such as Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Randal Quarles, who, according to the same Yahoo article, believes that “the Treasury market is now so large that the U.S. central bank may have to continue to be involved to keep it functioning properly.”

Back in September 2019, the Fed intervened in the repo market emergency that seemed to be caused by four big banks.

This year, in trying to rescue the economy from the brink of disaster back in March, the central bank attempted a monetary “moon shot”. But that intervention has put both the Fed and the U.S. economy in a dangerous and extremely leveraged position. So, the question remains…

Would “Endless” Fed Interventions Ever Solve Anything?

The short answer is we will have to see how it plays out. But the Federal Reserve’s track record of interventions since 2018 isn’t encouraging. One intervention seems to naturally lead to the next.

At a virtual panel hosted by the Hoover Institute, Fed Vice Chair Quarles also hinted at the possibility that these interventions can’t stop:

It may be that there is a simple macro fact that the Treasury market being so much larger than it was even a few years ago, much larger than it was a decade ago… the sheer volume there may have outpaced the ability of the private market infrastructure to support stress of any sort there.

What happens one, five, or even ten years from now if “endless” Fed interventions become reality? The results would be historic, possibly even catastrophic.

Best to Get Your Savings in Order

The Fed’s performance since 2018 reveals that if they have to keep intervening in the market, it could quickly spin out of control.

So examine your nest egg now, before it’s too late. Then consider whether to shift some of your savings to make it more resilient to Fed interventions.

Holding assets such as physical gold and silver can help to hedge against any potential Fed-driven economic fallout.

As a leading dealer of precious metals in the United States, Birch Gold Group is committed to helping our customers discover how gold, silver and other precious metals can help protect their lifestyles in the face of current and coming economic instabilities. This commitment is one of numerous factors that separates us from other precious metals dealers and enables us to consistently help our customers achieve their goals.

 

 

www.birchgold.com