ECON Discussion 5

by / On February 3, 2020 / In Money and Banking, Undergraduate

Since the 2007 financial crisis the Feds portfolio of Treasury and mortgage-backed securities has grown tremendously, from $900 to around $4.0 trillion today. In recent years there has been much discussion about how and how quickly the Fed may begin reducing the size of its balance sheet. What is the Feds balance sheet? Whats your take? Should the balance sheet be smaller?

Please see the links below for some useful background.

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/06/fed-balance-sheet-what-happens-why-it-matters-what-could-go-wrong.html

Hopper, L. (2018, July, 11). How the fed is reducing its balance sheetand why. Retrieved from https://www.stlouisfed.org/open-vault/2018/july/how-fed-reducing-balance-sheet

Ng, Michael. Wessel, David. (18, August 2018). The Hutchins Center Explains: The Fed’s balance sheet. retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2017/08/18/the-hutchins-center-explains-the-feds-balance-sheet/

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/ben-bernanke/2016/09/02/should-the-fed-keep-its-balance-sheet-large/

https://youtu.be/9F31y5aAxlc

https://youtu.be/tiy3VeY2CuE