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Astounding Incompetance at the Federal Reserve

The Fed inadvertently left a sentence out of the FOMC:

(Dow Jones)--The Federal Reserve said Tuesday it inadvertently left out one sentence from its statement for Tuesday's Federal Open Market Committee meeting, referring to still "well contained" inflation expectations.  "Longer-term inflation expectations remain well contained," reads the sentence added to the second paragraph of the FOMC statement.

The Fed explained its mistake in a release of the revised FOMC statement about one-and-a-half hours after initial release of the post-meeting statement. The statement was otherwise unchanged.  The Fed acknowledged Tuesday the U.S. economic recovery has lost some steam but said it remains worried about inflation and opted to persist with its campaign of gradual interest-rate increases.

Would someone please explain to me how the most important document from the Central Bank of the most economically significant country in the world -- goes out missing a sentence?

That is truly astonishing to me. If there is a goddamned document in the whole planet that needs to be proofed before going out, ITS THAT ONE.

>
Meanwhile, I have people taking 500 words in the comments section complaining that I used "it's" instead of "its."

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May 4, 2005 10:12 am
Yesterday, the Fed omission apparently led me to "fume."  (I'm glad they didn't use some of my dumber quotes) . . .

Sources:
Minimalist message leaves Fed a bit red
Seattle Times
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2002261971_fedwords04.html

Fed's slip-up shakes market
Baltimore Sun
http://www.baltimoresun.com/business/bal-bz.fed04may04,1,4264341.story?coll=bal-business-headlines&ctrack=1&cset=true

Tuesday, May 03, 2005 | 05:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0)
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Comments

You've got this one right...no excuse.

Posted by: Mark Thoma | May 3, 2005 6:50:15 PM

The competent spelling would be "incompetence."

Posted by: Reynold Weidenaar | May 3, 2005 8:01:57 PM

Exactly !

You just proved my point -- on a budget of exactly Zero dollars, with no staff, and doing this in addition to a full time job -- I misspelled a word.

Now compare a simple blog with one of the most powerful Federal agencies, with a staff of 1000s and a budget in the billions, whose very reason for existing are these meetings and the subsequent statements they release.

Is it asking too much that they get that simple statement -- Its a 1 pager, for crying out loud! -- correct the first time out of th gate?

Puh-leeze. If I am the standard the Federal Reserve is held to, we are all in deep doo-doo

See this link for more details:
http://federalreserve.gov/pf/pf.htm

Posted by: Barry Ritholtz | May 3, 2005 8:56:10 PM

Sorry barry, left early, and just got in, missed the "revision" YOU ARE SO $&%*(# RIGHT HERE. I wonder, is it the magician, or the wand?

Posted by: james | May 3, 2005 10:32:18 PM

Tell me why, in this global economy, the Fed thinks it needs to fight inflation. Prices as well as wages are now being determined by global rather than national supply and demand. The Fed’s importance in this equation is rapidly disappearing. Reminds me of Don Quixote.

Posted by: touche | May 3, 2005 10:37:46 PM

Maybe the Fed is trying to tell us to chill. So what if they left out a sentence? Does that mean that inflation really is out of control? The markets pay way too much attention to the Fed's words and not enough to 1) what the Fed does; and 2) what's going on in the economy.
David Gilmore of FX Analytics said it best: "If the Fed said it looks at the dark side of the moon to get a read on inflation expectations, the financial markets would be investing in a new lunar module to send Fed watchers there for a first hand look."
Start doing your own damn homework people!

Posted by: fred c. dobbs | May 4, 2005 11:26:39 AM

Actually, It's is correct in that context (meaning: it is that one)....

Posted by: Glenn | May 4, 2005 11:59:48 AM