Quotes About Interest rates

by making it costly for them to refinance.

lower long-term interest rates (to stimulate spending and investment) and raise short-term rates (to protect the value of the dollar, supposedly).

The critics based their argument on the fact that lower interest rates tend to raise prices for assets such as stocks and houses.

If not interest rates or monetary policy, then what? Most research on the origins of the bubble has focused on three factors: mass psychology; financial innovations that reduced the incentive for careful lending;

These longer-term rates are not under the Fed's direct control. Instead, they are set by participants in financial markets.

With little room to cut the funds rate further, how could we put downward pressure on longer-term rates?

It is said, that in Holland Interest is lower than in England.

The big question is: When will the term structure of interest rates change? That's the question to be worried about.

The job of the Central Bank is to worry.

If we did go into a recession, something that's always possible for the U.S. or Europe, we could lower interest rates and expand the money supply without worrying about the price of gold.

Should that worse scenario materialize, then most probably our propensity to increase interest rates will be weaker.

Debt certainly isn't always a bad thing. A mortgage can help you afford a home. Student loans can be a necessity in getting a good job. Both are investments worth making, and both come with fairly low interest rates.

In 1994, the Federal Reserve announced a tiny one-quarter-of-a-percentage-point rise in short-term interest rates, and the bond market went into a mad spin; leveraged hedge funds had been wrong-footed by the move, and they began dumping positions furiously.

The impact of low interest rates is broad and deep. Many Americans rely on interest income from their savings to help cover their cost of living.

I think we do need to try to not just rely on the central bank to, in its wisdom, adjust interest rates, but allow for people to avoid being exposed to inflation risk.

If the government is funding itself at 2 per cent, you know, how much are you going to pay savers if you want to lend money at a cheaper rate? People have the incentive to build a factory or open new stores. It is a trade-off.

Likewise, investors were delighted to earn 11% on bank certificates of deposit (CDs) in 1980 and are bitterly disappointed to be earning only around 2% in 2003—even though they were losing money after inflation back then but are keeping up with inflation now.

Why should not the effects of changing interest rates be divided on some practical and equitable basis between the borrower and the lender? One possibility would be to sell long-term bonds with interest payments that vary with an appropriate index of the going rate.

In June 1949 the S & P composite index sold at only 6.3 times the applicable earnings of the past 12 months; in March 1961 the ratio was 22.9 times. Similarly, the dividend yield on the S & P index had fallen from over 7% in 1949 to only 3.0% in 1961, a contrast heightened by the fact that interest rates on high-grade bonds had meanwhile risen from 2.60% to 4.50%. This is certainly the most remarkable turnabout in the public's attitude in all stock-market history.

In June 1970 the question "How much?" could be answered by the magic figure 9.40%—the yield obtainable on new offerings of high-grade public-utility bonds. This has now dropped to about 7.3%, but even that return tempts us to ask, "Why give any other answer?

I mean, I'm a conservative. I believe that, you know, if you borrow too much, you just build up debts for your children to pay off. You put pressure on interest rates. You put at risk your economy. That's the case in Britain. We're not a reserve currency, so we need to get on and deal with this issue.

We believe that the Federal Reserve has to carry on with a progressive increase in interest rates as a consequence of the American economy.

The Federal Reserve can only buy Treasuries and agencies, and moreover quantitative easing typically involves buying longer-term Treasuries and agencies in terms of bills, for example.

during the Asian financial crisis the United States and other Western countries demanded that the Asians take three steps--let bad banks fail, keep spending under control, and keep interest rates high. In it own crisis, the West did exactly the opposite on all three fronts.