Chris Low on the Elusive Quest for r*

19/09/2025 35 min Temporada 1 Episodio 60
Chris Low on the Elusive Quest for r*

Listen "Chris Low on the Elusive Quest for r*"

Episode Synopsis

FOMC participants disagree about current economic conditions as well as the current stance of monetary policy. The neutral fed funds rate, often called r*, is where policy is neither restrictive nor accommodative, and helps guide Fed officials’ assessments of optimal policy in the short- and long-run. As the Fed continues to normalize policy, the bond market will contend with the uncertain destination of short-term interest rates in the post-pandemic economy. In this episode, we talk with Chris Low, Chief Economist with FHN Financial, about the difficulty in estimating r*, how neutral policy estimates impact bond market pricing, and whether r* is a useful measure of broader financial conditions.