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Policy and Regulatory Commentary
What Happens if the Electoral College is a Tie?
The final set of questions in last night’s presidential debate – if you made it to the end of the 90-minute slugfest – was about the peaceful transition of power, and whether there would be one on January 20, 2020, inauguration day.
Policy and Regulatory Commentary
The Fight to Replace RBG
After a career of service as a distinguished jurist and, later in life, a cultural icon, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away on Friday, September 18, in the early hours of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year.
Market Outlooks
Turning up the heat on a boiling pot
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The passing of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has created a vacancy in the U.S. Supreme Court with only weeks until the November election. As the country awaits President Trump’s nominee, pundits on both sides of the aisle are claiming this process will strengthen their election chances. We see this process as primarily exacerbating the partisanship of U.S. voters and it is unclear which party will able to drive greater voter turnout or sway more independents
Fixed Income Insights
Interest rates: Lower for longer...or forever?
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On September 16, 2020, the U.S. Federal Reserve (Fed) left interest rates near zero and signaled that it expects to hold them there through at least 2023, adding outcome based guidance. The statement follows the new long-term policy framework announced by Chair Jay Powell in August at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s annual Jackson Hole conference. The Fed notes that rates will remain near zero “until labor market conditions have reached levels consistent with the Committee’s assessments of maximum employment and inflation has risen to 2 percent and is on track to moderately exceed 2 percent for some time.” We didn’t get a precise definition of what a moderate overshoot would look like, allowing the Fed to retain some flexibility.
Policy and Regulatory Commentary
The Payroll Holiday That Isn’t
Amidst a stalemate between the two parties on Capitol Hill regarding additional COVID-related legislation, President Donald Trump on August 8 issued an executive memorandum policy that said U.S. workers would not have to pay their Social Security payroll taxes from September 1, 2020 until December 31, 2020.
Policy and Regulatory Commentary
At This Point, Do Deficits Matter?
Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) – the nonpartisan federal agency within Congress that provides budget and economic information to lawmakers and is tasked with providing an analysis of the impact of every bill Congress enacts on the national budget – released a report that projects the U.S. annual budget deficit will exceed $3.3 trillion by the end of fiscal year 2020. That’s the end of this month.
Market Outlooks
A New Monetary Policy
Last Thursday, while almost 24 million Americans were gearing up to watch President Donald Trump’s Republican National Convention speech and the literal fireworks that followed, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell gave an historic speech of his own that sent rockets around the monetary policy world.