前美聯儲主席本·伯南克在週三表示，他很困惑，投資者竟然對美聯儲抱有極大的信心。
伯南克在佈魯金斯學會的網站上發表了博客，他說：長期通脹預期表明美聯儲在最近一段時間會將通貨膨脹控制在2%，盡管當前處於低利率時期。接下來就要由美聯儲來證實了。
這並不是新觀點，在過去的好時光裡，美聯儲能將短期利率提高到5%-6%。這為美聯儲提供了很大的利率削減空間以應對經濟下行。
但是想從金融危機中恢複過來是十分困難的。2008年至今，美聯儲的短期利率始終在0線上苦苦掙紮，直到最近才逐漸接近1%。美聯儲官員認為，在2019年之前，短期利率都不會突破3%。
因此美聯儲的彈藥已經不足以應對下一次危機了。換句話說，貨幣政策艱難意味著世界經濟正處於低利率困境中。事實上，美聯儲經濟學家的最新調查結果顯示，在未來的一段時間内，短期利率無限接近於零的概率高達40%。
如果美聯儲不能提供足夠的經濟刺激，通脹率很難達到2%的目標。但是市場參與者們認為通脹率會在2%附近持續很長時間。
伯南克說：“市場參與者和專家預測員似乎都對美聯儲信心十足，相信他們會付出一切代價，反轉不利的經濟局面。
伯南克說：“這份信心讓人感動，但政策制定者不能因此而沾沾自喜。”
聖弗朗西斯科聯儲主席約翰·威廉斯認為美聯儲真的需要好好考慮，推出更適用於零利率環境的政策。
Bernanke’s conundrum: Why do investors trust the Fed?
Former Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke said Wednesday he’s puzzled investors seem to have so much faith in the U.S. central bank.
Long-run inflation expectations reflect a belief the Fed will to be able to keep inflation near its 2% target even in the era of low interest rates, Bernanke noted in his latest blog post on the website of the Brookings Institution.
“It will be up to the Fed to prove worthy of that confidence,” he said.
The basic idea is not new. In past good times, the Fed was able to push short-term interest rates up to 5%-6%. This gave the central bank a lot of room to cut rates to combat an economic downturn.
But the recovery from the financial crisis has been different. Since 2008, the Fed is struggling to get short-term interest rates above zero and only lately has them close to 1%. Fed officials don’t expect short-term rates to hit 3% until 2019.
This leaves the Fed with little ammunition to fight the next recession. In other words, hobbled monetary policy means the economy is stuck in a low-rate world. In fact, new research from Fed economists suggests short-term interest rates could be “very close” to zero as much as 40% of the time going forward.
If the Fed cannot provide sufficient stimulus, then inflation should be expected to fall short of the central bank’s 2% target, Bernanke said. Yet market participants expect inflation to stay close to 2% over very long horizons.
“It appears market participants and professional forecasters believe that the Fed, perhaps in conjunction with fiscal policymakers, will ‘do what it takes’ to mitigate the adverse future encounters with the zero-lower-bound,” Bernanke said.
“That confidence is encouraging, but it should not be taken as license for policymakers to rest on their laurels,” he said.
San Francisco Fed President John Williams has said the Fed “really need[s] to think hard about our policy strategy that would be better suited for the zero-bound.”
本文翻譯由兄弟財經提供
文章來源：http://www.marketwatch.com/story/bernankes-conundrum-why-do-investors-trust-the-fed-2017-04-12