it ain't that complicated. If you don'tbelieve me read Morgan Stanley's preview for the semi-annual testimony: The Fedâs economic outlook has been consistent and well spelled out for some time, both in the official FOMC statements and in numerous speeches by Fed officials. They expect a period of below trend growth to help ease the âhigh level of resource utilizationâ and allow inflation to continue gradually moderating towards the 1% to 2% comfort zone. As the housing and auto recessions ease, they see growth returning to what they would perceive to be the sustainable trend of around 3% later in the year. Within this baseline forecast, the predominant risk is seen to be higher inflation. Chairman Bernankeâs testimony will likely broadly reiterate this outlook. Remarks from a number of Fed officials in the latest week had a clearly hawkish tilt, however, suggesting that there may be increasing nervousness among Fed officials that upside inflation risks are rising, and itâs possible the Chairmanâs testimony will hint at this.
