The Fed has failed to "regulate" markets via modulation of interest rates for so long they have lost fine control authority. The moment they attempt to tighten there will be real chaos. Greenspan mashed the pedal to the floor in the face of an overheating housing market and its been kept to the floor ever since. Blame George W. Bush for that. The Fed is clearly not independent.
Well, it's no wonder we've hardly seen any improvement in the REAL economy while the stock market went through the roof throughout the last decade. All the Fed chiefs starting from Greenspan were too damn dovish, caring only about raising asset prices (or preventing them from falling). I've been saying all along that these idiots use the stock market as the barometer for their interest rate decisions. That's all they care about. Thanks to them, we now have unsustainable asset prices, housing bubble, and exorbitant rental hike, not to mention that my favorite ice cream, Haagen Dazs, went up in price.
Speaking of Ice Cream and prices how about this - my sister and brother-in-law went to get some at a new Hershey's Ice Cream store right near them. $10 a friggen pint. I get can get a 1/2 gallon of Publix Premium (real 1/2 gallon, not 1 1/4 gallon like most of the major brands) for $7.00. still. Price hasn't gone up - yet. And I'd put Publix up with any private label brands. Actually IMO they are better. Now I know Hershey's or any other retail storefront operation will tell "but ours is made fresh everyday". Bulldonkey. Nowadays supermarkets turn over their inventory just as quick or maybe even quicker. A cup, cone or shake of your favorite flavor right then and there, okay. "Whatever the traffic will bear.". Buy it and take it home - no way. 4 pints $40 instead of the equivalent $7 1/2 gallon fack outta here
It's not the Fed, anymore than the betting lines in Vegas are controlled by the Fed. It's margin credit, i.e., leverage, which is influenced by other factors. The market is fundamentally controlled by human nature, i.e., greed, fear. The latter, Wall Street hucksterism exploits and creates a false confidence that we are better at predicting short-term market movement then we are. The Fed's influence on the market is only quite indirect via the affect of monetary policy on inflation and margin credit, which, again, is a creature mainly of fear and greed. The economy does, of course, strongly influence the long term market picture, and there Congress, the Fed, and man made or natural events all play a role. Typically the market oscillates between extremes of high and low and is irrational far more of the time than rational..... This, with the accompanying credit cycle, creates the business cycle which repeats ad infinitum.
Looks an awful lot like a year of down market from here. But that could be delayed if by some miracle the Democrats can get 51 votes on anything in the Senate, in particular on their infrastructure bill. It's odd how technically the Democrats should control the Senate with a nominal 51 votes. But because on hallmark issues they have only 49 votes, Mitch McConnell has managed to remain in charge. It would be a mistake to ever characterize McConnell as a great "Leader," but certainly it would not be wrong to say that he has been able to position himself as a gigantic barrier, figuratively standing akimbo in the Senate, around which nothing shall pass without his consent. Despite everything, he remains in charge of the U.S. Senate. That is quite an accomplishment! Though not necessarily something to be admired.* __________________ *I personally equate McConnell's performance to that of giving the finger to our Constitution. Certainly the Founders would never have conceived of anyone being so clever as to create a Senate Rule that would allow, on a whim, any individual Senator to indefinitely deactivate the entire U.S. Senate; thus subverting, by an ostensibly constitutional action, the Senate's Constitutionally directed role. How "clever" indeed!
But how would that make you feel lying in bed with Nancy Pelosi for another 4 years? She and her alter ego want to bulldoze over everything in their path.
I can't figure out who you had in mind as Speaker Pelosi's "alter ego," but Pelosi herself has never struck me that way. She just seems highly competent to me. She's 81, and yet she has very quick recall of facts, figures and names. She also seems to have a comprehensive, detailed understanding of legislation before the House and the workings of government. I think she is rather amazing, all the more so because of her age.