Hawkish former Dallas Fed president says he doesn’t understand doves like Kashkari

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Bloomberg News/Landov


Richard Fisher was president of the Dallas Fed from 2005-2015.

Former Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher, who was a renowned hawk during his decade at the central bank, said Tuesday he doesn’t get the thinking of current doves on the Federal Open Market Committee like Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari.

“I don’t understand Mr. Kashkari – I never have, never will,” Fisher said in an interview on CNBC.

At issue was Fisher’s case for more Fed rate hikes in coming months, saying the central bank needed to get the level of its benchmark rate higher so it had ammunition to combat any serious downturn.

“We don’t have enough ammunition in our holster to do so,” Fisher said.

Fisher seemed to have some animus toward the Minneapolis Fed president, who he later referred to as “Mr. Kardashian.”

Kashkari has urged the Fed to hold off raising interest rates, warning the central bank could push the economy into recession.

Read: Here’s what Fed officials are saying about the interest-rate outlook

“The logic of his argument doesn’t make sense,” Fisher said.

On the surface, it looks like Fisher and Kashkari have some things in common. For instance, both were strong advocates for further steps to end so-called “too-big-to-fail banks.”

Fisher, now a senior advisor to Barclays, said there was “probably a cap on how far the Fed can go” in raising interest rates but “they are not there yet.”

Normally, the Fed would raise interest rates to 5% in good times, he noted.

Fisher said concerns in financial markets about higher rates is a byproduct of the Fed’s bond-buying program used to stimulate the economy after the financial crisis.

“When you hammer rates down to zero and you make it clear you are going to keep things super-accommodative for ultra-long time, financial entrepreneurs…are going to go out and figure out new ways to capture risk,” he said.



Source : MTV