Bill Dudley

Goldman, whose Bill Dudley runs the New York Fed, and the Fed in general, gives the official party line on how to interpret the Fed's statement. Summary: all is well.

A month ago Zero Hedge, based on some Goldman observations, asked a simple question: is Okun's law now terminally broken? Today, with about a one month delay, the mouthpiece of the New York Fed (which in itself is nothing but a Goldman den of central planners, and Bill Dudley and Jan Hatzius are drinking buddies), Jon Hilsenrath shows that this is just the issue bothering his FRBNY overseers. In an article in the WSJ he ruminates: "Something about the U.S. economy isn't adding up. At 8.3%, the unemployment rate has fallen 0.7 percentage point from a year earlier and is down 1.7 percentage points from a peak of 10% in October 2009. Many other measures of the job market are improving. Companies have expanded payrolls by more than 200,000 a month for the past three months, according to Labor Department data. And the number of people filing claims for government unemployment benefits has fallen. Yet the economy is barely growing. Many economists in the past few weeks have again reduced their estimates of growth. The economy by many estimates is on track to grow at an annual rate of less than 2% in the first three months of 2012. The economy expanded just 1.7% last year. And since the final months of 2009, when unemployment peaked, the economy has expanded at a pretty paltry 2.5% annual rate." Hilsenrath's rhetorical straw man: "How can an economy that is growing so slowly produce such big declines in unemployment?" The answer is simple Jon, and is another one we provided a month ago - basically the US is now effectively "printing" jobs by releasing more and more seasonally adjusted payrolls into the open, which however pay progressively less and less (see A "Quality Assessment" Of US Jobs Reveals The Ugliest Picture Yet). After all, what the media always forgets is that there is a quantity and quality component to jobs. The only one that matters in an election year, however, is the former.  As for whether Okun's law is broken, we suggest that the New York Fed looks in the mirror on that one.

Earlier today, we reported that Germans are increasingly concerned that their gold, at over 3,400 tons a majority of which is likely stored in the vault 80 feet below street level of 33 Liberty (recently purchased by the Fed with freshly printed money at far higher than prevailing commercial real estate rates for the Downtown NY area), may be in jeopardy,and will likely soon formally inquire just how much of said gold is really held by the Fed. As it turns out, Germany is not alone: as part of the "Rettet Unser Schweizer Gold", or the “Gold Initiative”: A Swiss Initiative to Secure the Swiss National Bank’s Gold Reserves initiative, launched recently by four members of the Swiss parliament, the Swiss people should have a right to vote on 3 simple things: i) keeping the Swiss gold physically in Switzerland; ii) forbidding the SNB from selling any more of its gold reserves, and iii) the SNB has to hold at least 20% of its assets in gold. Needless the say the implications of this vote actually succeeding are comparable to the Greeks holding a referendum on whether or not to be in the Eurozone. And everyone saw how quickly G-Pap was "eliminated" within hours of making that particular threat. Yet it begs the question: how many more international grassroots outcries for if not repatriation, then at least an audit of foreign gold held by the New York Fed have to take place, before Goldman's (and New York Fed's) Bill Dudley relents? And why are the international central banks not disclosing what their people demand, if only to confirm that the gold is present and accounted for, even if it is at the Federal Reserve?

Since nobody else has any interest in downtown NY real estate, Goldman's Bill Dudley, currently incidentally in charge of the New York Fed, has decided to step up. "The Federal Reserve Bank of New York (New York Fed) today announced that it has acquired the building at 33 Maiden Lane for $207.5 million from Merit US Real Estate Fund III, L.P. and established a new, wholly owned limited liability company called Maiden & Nassau LLC to serve as owner of the building. The acquisition provides a cost-effective, long-term alternative to the current practice of leasing space in this and other buildings and allows for greater control over maintenance, operation and security of the building." As a reminder, the 9th floor of 33 Liberty is where the ever elusive, but always present Plunge Protection Team, pardon the "markets group" at the Federal Reserve is housed (more here). And although in recent days it is no secret that the bulk of Fed open market stock order are routed via that one certain HFT powerhouse out of Chicago, it is always a good idea to keep all the market manipulating facilities under one roof. And so, the Fed now will have full domain over everything that transpires under its own roof. And since the building likely has an extended basement, it provides Dudley, and his muppet Ben Bernanke with a convenient location where to store the soon to be confiscated 107 tons of Greek gold.

The last time the Fed tried to dump Maiden Lane 2 assets via a public auction in a BWIC manner, it nearly crashed the credit market. This time, the FRBNY, headed by one ex-Goldman Sachs alum Bill Dudley, has decided to go back to its shady, opaque ways, and transact in private, with no clear indication of the actual bidding process or transaction terms, and sell $6.2 billion in Maiden Lane 2 "assets" to, wait for it, Goldman Sachs, the same firm that would benefit in the first place if AIG's assets imploded (remember all those CDS it held on AIG which supposedly prevented it from losing money if AIG went bankrupt?). One wonders: does Goldman have a put option on the ML2 portfolio if the market experiences a sudden and totally impossible downtick some day? But all is well - we have assurance from the Fed that the sale happened in a "competitive process." Luckily, that takes care of any appearance of impropriety.

Earlier today, the New York Fed was kind enough to voluntarily disclose the finacial holdings and assets of one former Goldman Sachs employee, and current FRBNY president Bill Dudley. Bill Dudley is also known as the gentleman to have received, when he was stil head of the PPT, aka the Fed's Open Markets Group, a waiver signed by one Tim Geithner on September 19, 2008, allowing him to keep not only his investment in AIG, which was "de minimis" at $1,200, but also in General Electric, which was not de minimis at $106,830. And while his modest holdings of AIG likely did not impact Dudley's protocol of bailing out the failed insurer, his interest in GE, and thus its then fully held subsidiary NBC Universal, parent of such comedy channels as CNBC, could potentially have been a source of conflict. Which is why the Fed has disclosed the full holdings of Dudley as of the 2008 year, in which we find that the bulk of Dudley's net worth was held by JPMorgan Chase Deferred Income Benefit Award (over $1MM) and JPM Chase Deferred Compensation ($500,001-$1,000,000). Was Mr. Dudley also completely conflict free vis-a-vis the bulk of his holdings, and their custodian, and did the New York's Fed largesse to bail out JPM among many others, have anything to do with this particular heretofore unknown detail? Of course not. After all, Jon Corzine is a free man. In other news, anyone who needs urgent access to the discount window or a $1 trillion overnight loan at 0.001% interest, should just call the Fed's 24/7 hotline: 877-52-FRBNY.

As widely expected by Zero Hedge, barely a few months after the arrival of former Goldmanite Mario Draghi to head ECB, the ECB's balance sheet exploded by nearly $1 trillion. Naturally, such is the way of central banks infiltrated by tentacles of the squid: no surprises. Which brings us to the first Fed meeting of 2012 and its public manifestation: the FOMC's January 25 statement. As is well known, while the Goldman addition to the ECB is a recent development, its agent at the Fed, the head of the FRBNY Bill Dudley has been there for a quite a while - in fact ever since the tax-challenged Mike Judge character impersonator left to become Treasury Secretary. As was suggested on Zero Hedge, it was the meetings of Bill Dudley with Goldman's Jan Hatzius at the Pound and Pence, and of course elsewhere but these are the only public recorded ones, that have shaped monetary policy more than anything. In other words, if anyone can predict, not to say define, US monetary policy, it would be Jan Hatzius. Below are his just released "thoughts" on what to expect on Wednesday. What is odd is that whereas a month ago Goldman was convinced that an LSAP version of QE was imminent, now the firm has become substantially less optimistic. Is it time to manage down expectations? To wit: "Given the improvement in the economic indicators and the easing of financial conditions that has occurred in the meantime, we believe it is less central now. While Fed officials are certainly not targeting a tightening of conditions, we doubt that they will "bend over backwards" to deliver a dovish surprise relative to current market expectations." So just how much QE3 is priced in if Goldman is already doing disappointment damage control. Or did Goldman finally wise up and realize that the only effective Fed statement is the one that surprises. So if Goldman does not publicly expect QE3, and we do in fact get a notice thereof, it will have an immediate knee jerk reaction on risk, and of course, Gold. These and many more questions shall be answered at 12:30 pm on Wednesday.

Instead of opting for a publicly transparent BWIC in the disposition of its Maiden Lane II assets, the Fed has once again gone opaque - long a critique of the Fed's practices which have required repeated FOIAs in the past to get some clarity on its secret bailouts and transactions - and proceeded with a private sale, without any clarity on the deal terms, in which it sold $7 billion in face amount of Maiden Lane II assets direct to Credit Suisse. The alternative of course would be the same snarling of the MBS and broadly fixed income market that we saw in June of last year. In other words, the Fed looked at the options: transparency and risk of grinding credit demand to a halt, or doing what it does best, which is to transact in the shadows, and avoid capital markets risk. It opted for the latter. As to why the Fed decided to go ahead with a deal shrouded in secrecy? "The New York Fed decided to move forward with the transaction only after determining that the winning bid represented good value for the public." "I am pleased with the strength of the bids and the level of market interest in these assets," said William C. Dudley, President of the New York Fed. Because if there is one thing Bill Dudley and the Fed knows is gauging what is in the best interest of the public... and the callorie content of the iPad of course.

The committee on oversight and government reform is holding a hearing currently where Fed and Treasury officials will testify on the effect of the Euro crisis on US taxpayers. NY Fed President and former Goldmanite (also Bill Hatzius predecessor) Bill Dudley, Fed Board Acting Director of International Finance Steven Kamin, and Treasury Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Policy Mark Sobel will testify, in the House Oversight Committee. Without a doubt the three will say that Europe is cause of concern but nothing to worry about too much, even though earlier today a US Treasury official said that the EU debt crisis is a serious risk for US outlook, that it can hit the US through trade and the financial sector and that the IMF can't be substitute for strong and credible EU debt firewall.

The last time Bill Dudley hosted a Q&A on inflation, he made the now legendary phase, noted here, that people should just eat iPads and let their betters worry about such trivial problems as "transitory" inflation. Today Jan Hatzius' predecessor and Goldman's plant at the New York Fed continues his Titans of Taste (substitution) world tour, speaking in Tokyo, Japan, where he is experiencing one after another aftershock while discussing "Regulatory Reform of the Global Financial System." Select highlights from the speech: US economy in better shape than last summer; QE2 is partially responsible for recent rebound although the US economy has lost momentum in past few months due to oil prices; oil prices are negative to economic outlook; big focus for Fed is inflation expectations; expectations have not become anchored; CPI rise in US may be more modest than other countries as US starting at lower base; "it is important to not to overreact to rise in headline inflation as its likely to be temporary", there is more slack in the US economy than in Europe; "there should not be too much enthusiasm about tightening monetary policy too early", and many other such dovish rambling which once again confirm that Hatzius and Dudley are laying the groundwork for additional QEasing.

Yesterday when we speculated that Kocherlakota may have been leaked the NFP number based on his hawkish tone, we presented an attempt at refutation by Morgan Stanley's David Greenlaw who claimed the following: "I've heard some stories that Kocherlakota has seen tomorrow's employment report and that explains his hawkishness comments.  However, there is no way this is true.  Only the Fed Chairman gets the report ahead of time (late in afternoon on the day prior to release) and he doesn't even share it with the other governors -- never mind the regional bank Presidents." Let's do a little math exercise. Today at 8:30 am the BLS came out with a step change in the unemployment rate which dropped from 8.9% to 8.8%. So far so good. Then at 10:00 am Dudley released his speech from embargo with the following disclosure: "unemployment rate has fallen sharply over the past four months, dropping to 8.8 percent from 9.8 percent in November." Obviously Dudley was aware of the NFP number at the time of writing the speech. So our question is: did Dudley write the speech in the 1:30 hours between the NFP release (presumably while in Puerto Rico)? Or did he simply leave the unemployment data blank until the last moment and just filled it in after the official number was released? Since an embargoed version of the speech was likely released to various news outlets in advance, that cuts the time he had to pencil in the correction. Or, of course, if the embargoed version went out before 8:30 am that confirms that Dudley was well aware of the NFP number ahead of time, and roundly refutes the "fact" that only Bernanke sees the jobs number before its public release. Which then brings the question: who else sees the NFP number in addition to Bernanke? And just how profitable is the industry of distributing forward looking economic data at time of embargo distribution, especially when it pertains to something as critical as the NFP number.

Punchline from Dudley's Puerto Rick speech just hitting the wires: "We must not be overly optimistic about the growth outlook. The coast is not completely clear—the healing process in the aftermath of the crisis takes time and there are still several areas of vulnerability and weakness. In particular, housing activity remains unusually weak and home prices have begun to soften again in many parts of the country. State and local government finances remain under stress, and this is likely to lead to further spending cuts, tax increases, or job losses in this sector that will offset at least a part of the federal fiscal stimulus. To sum up, economic conditions have improved in the past year. Yet, the recovery is still tenuous. And, we are still far from the mark with regard to the Fed's dual mandate. In particular, the unemployment rate is much too high." Word count of iPad: zero.

Earlier today, Goldman New York Fed plant, and Jan Hatzius predecessor, Bill Dudley, emerged from his ivory tower to make a trek to Queens to deliver prepared remarks written by some intern, discussing the prospering state of the New York burrough (speech link). Unfortunately for the multi-millionaire, things quickly went from Unicorny and Rainbowy to horribly wrong. During the Q&A, one audience member asked: "When was the last time, sir, that you went grocery shopping?" A stunned Dudley did not have the heart to elaborate that the caviar and ambrosia eaten on the Dudley family table is hand delivered through the Fed's G-6 from Kamchatka, so instead, as Reuters reports, he "tried to explain how the Fed sees things: Yes, food prices may be rising, but at the same time, other prices are declining. The Fed looks at core inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy costs, to get a better sense of where inflation may actually be heading." At which point he proffered his sage advice to the increasingly restless natives: "Let them eat iPad."

Former Goldman managing director, and current uberhead of the Fed Ponzi extend and pretend efforts, Bill Dudley, gets the prize for today's moment of lunatic brilliance. Some choice quotes from a speech delivered to the NYU Stern Busines School:

• Fed is not an exporter of inflation and not to blame for inflation in emerging markets
• It would be unwise for the Fed to overreact to recent commodity price pressures
• Current Fed policy is in the interest of the world's economy
• Rates likely to stay low for extended period
• Several areas of vulnerability for US economy, and sees need to be ever watchful for any price bubbles

"To sum up, although the national economy experienced a pick-up in activity during the last quarter of 2010, the region saw a pause. The loss of momentum locally is disappointing because until the fourth quarter, much of the region was recovering somewhat faster than the nation. However, I would not be overly discouraged by this. After all, soft patches are not uncommon during economic recoveries. Both nationally and regionally, unemployment remains stubbornly high, but many indicators suggest that conditions are in place for stronger growth in the coming months. With respect to debt, households in most parts of the region are in better shape than the nation as a whole. They increased their debt burdens less during the boom and thus have had less need to deleverage. In addition, there are emerging signs both nationally and regionally that consumers have begun to spend more and appear willing to take on some new debt. This bodes well for another step forward in terms of economic momentum in the nation and the region. However, high delinquencies in New York City and Long Island are a reminder that many households remain under significant stress." - Bill Dudley