Obama Gives “Taper” New Meaning: So Who’s Next at the Fed?
On the eve of the Fed’s two-day policy meeting, President Obama added another level of uncertainty to the event by suggesting Ben Bernanke is unlikely to remain Fed chairman after his current term expires in January.
Bernanke has “already stayed a lot longer than he wanted or he was supposed to," Obama told Charlie Rose in an interview that aired Monday evening.
The meeting was already hotly anticipated given the market’s obsession with whether or not the Fed will “taper," i.e. signal plans to scale back on its current $85 billion per month quantitative easing program. Now President Obama has reminded everyone about another uncertainty with the potential to move markets: Who will replace Bernanke as Fed chair?
According to a Bloomberg poll last month, current Fed Vice Chair Janet Yellen is the most likely candidate to replace Bernanke. Former Treasury Secretaries Tim Geithner and Larry Summers also garnered more than 5% of votes in the poll.
In the accompanying video, Yahoo! Finance Senior Writer Michael Santoli and I discuss the implications of Obama’s comments, handicap Bernanke’s likely replacement and discuss some potential “out of the box” candidates as well.
Let us know what you think: Who would you like to see as next Fed chairman? Put your suggestions in the comment section below or email [email protected].
Aaron Task is the host of The Daily Ticker and Editor-in-Chief of Yahoo! Finance. You can follow him on Twitter at @aarontask or email him at [email protected]