speaker, what is the federal reserve? i think even many members of this body couldn't answer that question, and yet congress has delegated its constitutional authority to this committee of bankers and presidential appointees. congress has given so much power while knowing so little. the central bank, we trust the federal reserve for managing inflation. that means the fed can change the value of americans' life savings, their mortgages. lately the fed has taken on the role of, quote, lender of last resort. it has promised billions of dollars to the country's largest financial institutions. when investors wouldn't buy mortgages, the fed did. when creditors became worry of congress' spending bin g, the fed stepped in. -- binge, the fed stepped it. the government's accountants understandably were outraged saying they couldn't, quote, satisfactorily audit the federal reserve system without the authority of examining the fed's largest assets. congress should be weary of all types of central planning. we should be especially vig

the federal reserve believes that if growth does not pick up soon, the federal reserve will act in terms of providing more stimtlous this market. almost immediately the market reverses course, starts seeing a good rally, cutting the losses in half. financials the big beneficiary. that's where we saw a number of moves on the upside here reversing course at the end of the day. the do you down 103 points. the nasdaq down about 1% at 2862, and the s&p 500 tonight at 1338. it was those reports that the federal reserve is moving closer to act that lifted markets. we bring in strategy talk right now with david cudlan, david steinberg, and keith wertz. how important is new stimulus from the federal reserve right now? >> the market has been waiting for this announcement for a couple months now. the gdp being released -- i think the market is preparing the fed is preparing the markets for action on the horizon. >> why do that? why come out and say if growth doesn't pick up we'll be there soon. >> i think they wanting to take action. it's ironic, if you think about the last 20 years, it's been rare

might say quantitative easing in allowing the federal reserve to extend loans based on different collateral than they had in the founding document. and then, of course, the federal government, other programs that supported farmers much more directly, and much more visibly than farmers could see, and consequently vote for. and so edison's which medicines the farmer but somewhat indirectly, and at a relatively high cost, were addressed more directly by helping farmers directly. and in a day when farmers were still a very strong former block helping farmers directly publicly probably with a more efficient in terms of vote getting way to go about it. so in terms of what addison's view says to us today, well, number one, he was right about the gold standard. he was working in 1921. in 1933, the franklin delano roosevelt administration eliminated monetary gold in circulation. for all intents and purposes for the average guy on the street, that was the end of the gold standard. they also, for international transactions, revalued gold from just hundred $21 an ounce to $35 an ounce of gold. doesn't

and then share the federal reserve because mr. bush had an important economic appointment to make. he said give me the usual suspect bush is mr. bernanke. he's generally bipartisan and therefore advocate his analysis of the economy and there's little to do with the right partisan caricature over here. i read the economic report. there's a basic statement or economy has been recovering from the terrible crisis by the complete absence of regulation and unchecked responsibility by some financial institutions, obviously not all. and we are told that it is slowed down by a number of fat tears. the most important according to the way it's presented as what's going on in europe. nothing we have done is responsible. in fact the federal reserve is helpful for partisan criticism for cooperation with the ecb to ease the situation to her benefit. we are told there is a problem because there's the attacks and policy. >> i think we can cut military spending. a better way to do it is to tell western europe are unknown as to stop fakery and we've

everybody knows that the federal reserve is the federal express. watching on the hill there for the audit. i have been following you on the daily poll and shows. and also veterans for ron paul. we know you got more donations than the president and all the other candidates combined from veterans and military. i was wondering if you are going to be able to speak -- going to have the paulfest and i would like to be down there. there ain't no difference between romney and obama. you are the last, i think, honest man on capitol hill. i appreciate what you do. thank you, sir. guest: thank you. i will be speaking at the rally that i'm putting together on sunday, which is on the 26th of august. your point is well taken about the military. the top four categories of donations come from the army, navy, marines, and air force. those are my top donations. i have been in the military. he's right. i got more money than everybody else put together. because the accusation here in washington is, if you don't vote for the war, if you don't vote for more money, if yo

federal reserve know about it? "nightly business report" is brought to you by: captioning sponsored by wpbt >> susie: on wall street another day in the red for stocks. major averages closed lower after those minutes for the fed came out showing no clear plan on how to boost the economy. the dow lost almost 50 points, bringing its losing streak to five straight sessions, the nasdaq fell 14, and the s&p 500 closed off a fraction. some mixed news on the economic front. the u.s. trade gap narrowed for the second straight month in may, on a big drop in prices for oil imports. the deficit narrowed almost 4% as exports increased and purchases from abroad fell. u.s. exports to europe rose nearly 3%, despite the ongoing euro-zone debt crisis. but the u.s. deficit with china widened by over 6%. >> tom: those rising chinese exports are a key reason that country's economy expanded rapidly the past decade, but now china's growth is slowing. and that's starting to take a toll on earnings of u.s. firms doing business there. erika

minute constitutional amendment allowing income tax coincidentally that is the same year that the federal reserve was created passed by congress the fed reserve act so we didn't need income tax before the federal reserve and with the federal reserve we do is this just a coincidence. and then this debt based monetary system where we borrow all currency into existence and promise to pay it back with interest means that we have to work in the future and pay taxes just to pay the interest on the currency that's in circulation today the prosperity we're enjoying today is this a for a minute in slave moment and do you think this is moral and if it is a form of in slave meant and you think that it's moral then you should stay where you're at if you don't quit and close the federal reserve the very get go final word for ben bernanke yeah you got it you got to introduce a new tax if are going to pay for all that deficit spending i really appreciate you being on the show mike maloney it's always very enlightening to talk to you mike maloney's author and founder of gold silver dot com thanks so much. thank

so the federal reserve is a relatively new institution, and the reserve district banks are finding their y. foosn. yk oin it's got more power because of where it's located. that counter to what the framers of the federal reserve act were hoping for, but reality being webao edison. now, edison starts studying this complex kind of layering it, looking at it, realizing it's very comely candidate. and -- mplid. unrstag tet picppor m ane' oiob to cast gold out. he thinks gold and gold-backed money is a mistake, but he also realizes you've got all of the business and all of the international business community running old. yocan' sthath w y,ging you know? we're going to something different. so his attempt is to graft be on a plan to help farmers to stabilize their incomes and hope thathr time itro olna a beces kind of pushes gold out. so rather than throw gold overboard, he's going to graft on other commodities to bac ney inrderheos ucin s wth the government implicitly helps the gold producer. you're aold miner, you can go down in the ground, pull out gold, bring it to a government mint, have

regarding the federal reserve's role, the federal reserve bank of new york takes the lead in gathering market intelligence for the federal reserve system. it was in the process of gathering market intelligence when it received information about libor's submissions, notably phone call on april 11, 2008, in which a trader in barclay's new york told an employee of the federal reserve that he thought that barclay was underreporting its rate. about that same time, stories began to appear in the media as well. there was an april 16 story in "the wall street journal" and "financial times" also had a number of stories. i'd like to make two preliminary points before talking about the federal reserve's response to that information. first, the information the fed received was about the bank's possibly submitting low rates in order to appear -- to avoid appearing weak during the period of the crisis. the transcripts of the phone calls that were released have no reference to the manipulation of rates for profit by derivatives traders as alleged by the recent decision. the second point i'd like to m

with the federal reserve. some analysts are saying maybe the fed is going to wait and see what europe does first, because the fed meeting comes before the european meeting. the fed is in a tough spot. the jobs market is slowing down, and there's an unemployment number on friday. the federal reserve will have access to that number going into a two day meeting. i wouldn't be surpriseed to see them act in some way to acknowledge the markets are expecting them to keep interest rates low and provide more liquidity into the system the latter part of the year. >> susie: there's a lot of room for disappointment. on one hand, the investors are waiting for the fed to take action on what everybody calls qe 3. on the other hand, maybe investors there doubts it will be a meaningful impact on growth. what do you think is going to happen here? >> the bottom line is markets need further stimulus to work higher. you have a good stock market in the u.s., and a good bond market. but the market is impatient for activity from the

regarding the federal reserve's role, and the federal reserve bank of new york takes [inaudible] it was in the process when it received information about libor submissions, notably a phone call on april level of 2008 in which a trader in barclays told an employee of the federal reserve that he thought that barclays was underreporting its rate. about that same time, stories began to appear in the media. there was an april 16 story. i would like to make two preliminary points before talking about their response to that information. the information the fed received was about the banks possibly cementing lower ranks in order to appear -- submitting lower ranks and ordered to appear less week. the transcripts of the phone calls have no reference to the manipulation of rates for profit by derivatives traders as alleged by the recent decision. the second point i would like to make is that this issue was complicated during the crisis by the fact that there were very few transactions than occurring overnight. banks are asked to report what they would pay their borrowing at a certain term. it may

the federal reserve is a menace it has been for almost one hundred years it actually privatized the money function once you have the money function privatized and all of the actions attendant there to then money policy is determined by a few at the expense of the many and that's exactly what's happening to your business is honest businesses don't have a chance in this economy the economy is rigged against honest business men and it's being manipulated by crooks who are global right now it's a could see no economy and now they could see you know is run out of. out of the london. out of live war and action dot com what are you doing this well i you know i'm not i'm not going to be returning to congress after january second so what i'm doing is making a natural transition to. an organization that will help candidates get elected and also promote important issues and consented to action dot com will help candidates who are interested in monetary policy reform and peace in health care and the environment and all those things that we care about so if you check it out it can send it to

federal reserve into a negative cash flow i don't know i have to look at their balance sheet i know they have a lot of junk on their balance sheet without adjustable rates so i'm sure it would throw the federal reserve into more difficult times too but mr lister i've said to you before in america we've had three central banks the first two disappeared for a variety of reasons this one's going to destroy itself i mean they keep making such absurd decisions that they're they're going to put themselves out of business eventually which will be good news for all of us i mean the world has difficulties without a central bank but this central bank my goodness it's certainly not good for america or for the world well and one thing though that we have seen is people still running to the u.s. dollar and u.s. treasuries and giving some kind of placating effect on the fed and the u.s. government and policymakers here in d.c. with the euro being in the situation it is how long does this prolong the slumber and the u.s. or do you see some kind of a day of reckoning. well i own the u.s. dollar at

as a result, the federal reserve is then required to reduce the quantity of credit money in the market such that the tendency toward inflation and the redemption in gold must cease. >> that puts a first-fact check on the congress and the treasure for financing. as a result, the federal reserve is then required to reduce the quantity of credit money in the market such that the tendency toward inflation and the redemption in gold must cease. that's puts a first fact check on the congress and the treasury for financing, and as a result, it ties right to the first gentleman's question about, in a democratic republic like the united states, governed by a supreme law of the constitution, the money supply should be in the hands of the people. it should not be in the hands of the elite. that is to say it should be in the people. the governing board at the fmoc decides in camera what it sees at the end of the day. of course convertible currency put it is control of the money back in the hands of the people. that's precisely why the first coinage act of america defined the dollar as a weight uni

or fix to use the proper word so the federal reserve the european central bank the swiss national bank all the rest are in the business of imposing their judgement on the marketplace so they do this many ways most visibly they they set a money market interest rate that goes in this country by the name of the federal funds rate and that rate happens to be zero zero zero s. before tax mind you so the savers get zero before tax the speculators get to borrow at zero with which to finance their speculations so one can make. a good many arguments against the nebulae sion of rates and i have but the the library scandal it seems to me is is this as a scandal is almost infinitely insignificant the significant scandal is that is the on going to pillaging of rates by our central banks why do you think more people are making that connection have more so upset about live our lives why aren't we more upset about central bank manipulation at rates as a realist i think that i think there is a ritual loathing of of big money and big financial institutions that is certainly understandable not entirely m

as the interest rate that the federal reserve manipulates the target's. short term interest rates and so when you see comes out with his policy decision and on c n b c or a capital account they say the fed cut the fed funds target rate by zero point two five or twenty five basis points that's what they're talking about so the problem with the federal funds market and at least it's on security so we have more of an apples to apples comparison is that since october of two thousand and eight it's a vastly different market and that's the time period in which banks got the ability to receive payments called interest on excess reserves by the federal reserves so they park all their excess money at the fed and get an interest rate which heretofore had never been done before so the federal funds market doesn't behave like the other markets anymore and i can tell you a few reasons why but here i am. ok the first is the biggest sellers in the market are the g s c's that's fannie and freddie no why are these guys biggest lenders or sellers that's because they don't

period of the gold standard, at the onset of the first world war, with the inauguration of the federal reserve of bank, we had a financial collapse in 1920-21, almost unprecedented in its severity and its speed. jim grant has written a good deal on the subject. we had the worst depression in american history, which milton freedman himself laid at the doorstep of the central bank. we had 11% unemployment in 1982 after paul volcker ascended to the chairmanship of the central bank. in 1974 we also -- 73, 74, 75, followed by the worst decade in american economic history after of the second world war also inaugurated by central bank management of the monetary system. so perhaps -- all i mean to say is, it's always compared to what? on this -- which i think the gold standard, the classical gold standard, for example, stands up very well to the age of central banking, establish in the united states of the last 100 years. on the cost of the gold standard, the cost of the gold standard is but a fraction, a small fraction, of the cost of the management paper currency system. just give you one equation t

so my thinking is that instead of taking one's entire risk with the federal reserve to give nature a shot at it as well right. so with a tree you're at risk of a thousand canker disease but not so much with you know with peregrine or with the right right right is different kind of risk it's never been kind of risks that are or is it is not within the financial system it is outside of the financial system a very innovative alternative i don't know what's the what's they say in the financial quarterly so uncorrelated risk correlated risk there you go in a world of so many correlated thank you so much you know every morning down on its own you know it's artsy it's you know. i guess you could call that the mother nature risk now that is not all of my conversation with jim grant you can go online and catch a web extra at our you tube channel it'll be up shortly because i'm sure you saw the j.p. morgan reported a five point eight billion dollar london whale trading loss to date a lot more than they originally reported it would be and they will clawed back compensation for two years for the

in a sense of what it was when the federal reserve was founded and i fear we're going to see much more much higher prices much more economic turmoil that's going to be in this country like it is in europe and until we get rid of keynesianism central banking and these institutions that empower big banks and big governments to poke a stick in the eye of the rest of us to their own benefit we're going to have more and more trouble so if you're concerned about any kind of society and onto our children our grandchildren and not have this runaway government and runaway banks and their collusion against the rest of us you know we need we need and. well if if i do still have you here and looks like maybe we're running into into some problems we have you back again because quickly before we go to break i do want to ask you see more trouble ahead i'm curious what kind of trouble because five years ago we had a massive financial crisis people lost millions of dollars in their investments and savings unemployment lines suddenly were were long and it was a it was a real crisis so when do you see th

so, the federal reserve bank of new york took the lead here. a good bit of information. they are looking for additional information. they will release it if they find it. on the board side, we were in supporting mode. we provided analytic support, notably about the issues related to the construction of libor. our staff were in contact with the cftc in april and may to provide analytical support and governor crossner on the board at that time was in contact with the british authorities and the bba during may and june. i think it's important to note that following the federal reserve bank of new york's disclosures to the appropriate authorities, that there was rapid follow up. the cftc was making inquiries as early as april 2008. it sent requests for information to u.s. banks in the fall of 2008. the s.e.c. initiated inquiry in 2009 and the doj in 2010. currently, the european commission and range of other regulators, including british regulators, are also investigating and we know about the june 27th settlement with barcla barclays. so there was

guest: the federal reserve has a lot to do with desperate if you did not have a federal reserve, thet would be self limiting. the federal reserve is unable or for congress to expand and not be responsible. they can inflate the currency and print money. if you want welfare benefits for everybody and there is no limits, you like the fed because the debt can be run up and look at where we are today. interest rates are low because the fed is printing money like crazy. the only problem is that debt is unsustainable. that is why the markets are right here right now and worldwide, it is a phenomenon. we are doing better than the rest because other countries are doing so badly. compared to greece and spain, we look pretty good but the debt is run up because there is a strong appetite from the american people to keep fighting and putting these troops overseas and a strong appetite. we can't allow anybody not to have a check from the government. about half the country now lives off the other half. that will inevitably run up the debt and cause the big crash that will be very devastating to all

regarding the federal reserve's role, the federal reserve bank of new york takes the lead in gathering market intelligence for the federal reserve system. it was in the process of gathering market intelligence when it received information about libor's submissions, notably phone call on april 11, 2008, in which a trader in barclay's new york told an employee of the federal reserve that he thought that barclay was underreporting its rate. about that same time, stories began to appear in the media as well. there was an april 16 story in "the wall street journal" and "financial times" also had a number of stories. i'd like to make two preliminary points before talking about the federal reserve's response to that information. first, the information the fed received was about the bank's possibly submitting low rates in order to appear -- to avoid appearing weak during the period of the crisis. the transcripts of the phone calls that were released have no reference to the manipulation of rates for profit by derivatives traders as alleged by the recent decision. the second point i'd like to m

regarding the federal reserve's role, and the federal reserve bank of new york takes of the federal reserve system./ it was in the process when it received information about libor submissions, notably a phone call on april level of 2008 in which a trader in barclays told an employee of the federal reserve that he thought that barclays was underreporting its rate. about that same time, stories began to appear in the media. there was an april 16 story. i would like to make two preliminary points before talking about their response to that information. the information the fed received was about the banks possibly submitting lower ranks and ordered to appear less week. the transcripts of the phone calls have no reference to the manipulation of rates for profit by derivatives traders as alleged by the recent decision. the second point i would like to make is that this issue was complicated during the crisis by the fact that there were very few transactions than occurring overnight. banks are asked to report what they would pay their borrowing at a certain term. it may have been that transactions

so, again, i want to agree with the basic premise that the federal reserve should be slowly transparent, federally accountable. i will work with everyone here to make sure that's the case, but i do feel it's a mistake to eliminate the exemption for monetary policy and deliberations which would effectively, at least to some extent, create a political influence or political dampening effect on the federal reserve's policy decisions. host: federal reserve chairman ben bernanke testifying last week. here are some headlines. bernanke slams ron paul's fed audit bill. guest: when he talks about independence, he talks about secrecy. he talks about politics. i mean, it is a very political organization. what they can do, you know, they -- he does not want the congress to have oversight, but he talks to and works with the treasury department. he works with the executive branch, but the executive branch doesn't have the authority to manipulate monetary policy either. if he can give loans to private banks and private corporations in secret, how more -- how much more political can you get? and then b

he's right a lot of this has ended up as deposits in the federal reserve system but you look at what es, long-term interest rates, evidence it has had an impact on stock prices. the question is how big. has it been able to overcome the other problems we have in the economy? absolutely not but this has been something that has been effective and indeed it was one of the important things that helped keep us from getting into a much deeper recession -- >> i know the argument we would have been worse but the money is still lying fallow at the fed, it has not been put to work. >> let me add one thing on this. the issue is not quantity, it prices. research shows quite clearly is that asset price has been affected in a way that's expansionary for the country and that's key. >> larry, that's not provable. that is not provable. >> there's nothing provable in economics. that's what we do for a living. >> he cannot make that statement. all he's saying is that we pumped up asset prices and that's not the job of the fed. the job of the fed is to hit its target for inflation. it wisely chose not to

in the meantime the federal reserve says he doesn't expect one of the biggest worries about the american economy to become a nomy and that it's e re a house commit rease in wth in weakness is the fed chairman also eurozo a and until of financial market volatility. >> the federal reserve painted picture of the financial states a modest to moderate pace. document on hearings 12 district banks held wit une and early july. the baseball book says the housing market remained largely lling. the of an areas showed owth in year but auto sales remained strong, especially for the taking that and other factors into account, the overall report is cautious about the current u.s. economic si new home monthly price index on new homes for 17 major cities. they recorded the steep rise in 0.6% in june. cities cities during the first five months of th statistics a of the japan. the commission is tasked with talks. and the eu ork ing the economic partnership agreement. needs to make starting has made on implementation has not been satisfactory, i will stop the japan avoid strong talks. >>> we're focusing on

during the years the federal reserve act was debated and written, iing fserae amr el hri b. and desed a scheme of his n. he was will bone up the firshaf and onchgt wind edisonwasor o mengey t reglheer therd udry aneykemun s ysno a the money. edison said i have read your book. t inu wr t aury ob he invited him to go to congress. edison demured. ybe by that imehwa ni wth. is at an avrageyhi t say today? how did he do his research d? >>y at time heas sus.d th bht as o n ie 1t tedh e they tell us? es oco a money and in place 0 and ance. he wasaaucg nen. adn uge crisis. he did not have to be told watch out. so the dollar had to be back by something real. you start learning with thgoldys tet er b. then just a few years before y d n hmt operate the of the day would lead citn the of lthrue was the dce crd t saae ro 12 federal reserve districs e eatewits atbthpte er b then the public interest overseeh ytmto board t ont orn.ity ert looking to the banks to harmonize. later on there was quite a black -- battle within to bring more power from the federal reserve tohe board but that is a

in 2008, geithner was head of the new york federal reserve. he sounded an early warning with british and u.s. regulators about weaknesses in the bank-to- bank lending rate known as libor. it's a key global interest rate and one which traders and banks are accused of manipulating. darren gersh reports members of congress aren't convinced geithner did enough. >> reporter: back in the spring of 2008, geithner says he sent a detailed memo to the bank of england warning that it needed to reform the way british bankers came up with the libor rate. >> we were aware of the risk that the way this was designed created not just the incentive for banks to under-report, but gave them the opportunity to under-report and that was a problem. >> reporter: but members of congress said the problem was deeper. >> if they were having structural problems, i thought your email was appropriate. but what was being disclosed here was fraud. >> reporter: geithner argues british bankers set libor and british regulators had the authority to act. >> our first instinct as y

chairman of the federal reserve testing before the house financial services committee. hill. >> the excess reserves are not the issue. the issue is the state of financial conditions. we are still able to lower interest rates, improve, broadly speaking, asset prices, and that provides some incentive. if i might -- >> are we not essentially in a negative real interest rate environment already? >> let me just agree with you on the following. that monetary policy is not a panacea. it is not the ideal tool. part of the problem is that we hit the zero lower bounds. we can't hit the usual practice of cutting short-term interest rates. i'd like to see other parts of the government -- >> in the very limited time i have, mr. chairman, i got to tell you when i'm speaking to either fortune 50 ceos, world class investors, small business people in east texas here's what i hear. number one, uncertain federal regulation and certainly harmful federal regulation is crushing jobs. number two, the threatened single largest tax increase in u.s. history. number three, a nation on the road to

and also quantitative easing which you're clearly considering our own federal reserve bank of new york estimates that about 50% of the value of s and p over the last decade is related to fed action. and the buildup around fed action of quantitative easing. and my concern now is that what we're seeing is not an increase in the value of stock. but a projection in the loss of value of our dollar. and while we talk about that no inflation, i think what we're talking about is no visible inflation at this time because clearly if we're printeding more money to buy more of our national debt -- and i think you'll agree the federal reserve through intermediaries has bought over half of our debt the last coup of of years -- we have delude diluting the value of our dollar over time. and while it may not show up today or tomorrow, it's inevitable that i will will show up. and i think we see that in the reflection of the price of stocks because it's obvious that that doesn't reflect long term projections of value and profits as much as it does playing the market and what is coming out of the federal

that's just the balance sheet of the federal reserve. it's not really money spent, it's just shoveling money from long-term into short-term and bringing more cash into the economy. but i think the fed should do more. what i'm missing, really, from bernanke is a sense of urgency. i mean, we're acting as if qe-3 is the only thing we could do. operation twist would be another way to go. the fed could change its targets. for instance, could target unemployment rates as some have suggested, it could target growth rates, which ultimately -- >> christian, they've been targeting -- let's be honest. he's been trying to get -- >> that's the problem. the federal reserve -- >> but it was an explicit mandate to do so. i find it hard to believe he would have suddenly had a magic tool -- bullete didn't already try to use. >> we do know that these explicit targets matter. that they do create certainty that they create self fulfilling expectations. that they will bring in more spending, because then it says, okay, well, the federal reserve says unemploym