MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming next on The World and Everything in It, the Monday Moneybeat.
NICK EICHER, HOST: President Trump last week said he’s nominating economist and Fed critic Stephen Moore to the board of the Federal Reserve. Moore is an ally of White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow and an advocate of low taxes. He had been highly critical of Fed chairman Jay Powell, especially during the time the central bank was raising interest rates. At the time, Moore worried the rate hikes were jeopardizing economic growth. He went so far as to call publicly for Powell’s firing, before the Fed reversed course. After Trump announced Moore’s nomination, a Bloomberg television reporter on Friday asked him whether he might have an awkward working relationship with the chairman.
AUDIO: That was probably written in a time of anger. By the way, I think everyone would now acknowledge that what they did in December with the rate increase was a very substantial mistake. And the Fed has, thank God, reversed that and changed directions.
Rough day on Friday on Wall Street. A big one-day selloff ate up all the week’s gains. A closely watched predictor of coming recession reared its head: a phenomenon known to economists as an “inverted yield curve” on government bonds. That’s when a short-term bond investment yields more than a long-term investment. It’s a bond-market signal of long-term pessimism and frequently predicts recessions. It was the first such inversion since 2007.
So for the week, all the major indexes lost ground: The Standard & Poor’s 500 down eight-tenths of a percent, the Dow down 1.3. The Nasdaq lost six-tenths, and the Russell 2000, 3.1.
And that is today’s Monday Moneybeat.
