Dimon: Fed 'right to pause' rates, may not be done hiking
JPMorgan Chase (JPM) CEO Jamie Dimon spoke with Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi in an exclusive interview, sharing his opinions on the Fed's November rate decision and the general outlook on regulators' monetary policy.
The Federal Reserve held interest rates in a range of 5.25%-5.50% at its November policy meeting on Wednesday, just hours before Yahoo Finance's interview with the bank CEO. On Wednesday, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the Fed is, "not thinking about rate cuts at all."
"I think they're kind of right to pause here a little bit and see what happens," Dimon said. "But I suspect they might not be done — there's a chance that inflation is just a little stickier than people think and the fiscal and monetary stimulation of the last several years is more than people think."
This post was written by Luke Carberry Mogan.
Video Transcript
JAMIE DIMON: I think they're right to pause here a little bit and see what happens.
But I suspect that they may not be done.
I think there's a chance that inflation is just a little stickier than people think, and the fiscal and monetary stimulus of the last several years is more than people think, unemployment's very low.
We'll see.
- They have a long way to go on inflation.
I think, Chairman Powell, Jerome Powell, made that very clear.
How much higher do you think they have to go on rates?
JAMIE DIMON: So you have two separate rates since the short end and it's called the 10-year.
And on the short end they are 5 and 3/8 or whatever.
Maybe 25, 50, 75 more.
And I'm not predicting that, I just think there's a higher chance than probably other people think.
The 10-year is not set by them.
So that went up, they influence it with words and stuff like that, but there's supply and demand of buyers of bonds from around the world.
The supply is up dramatically much more than people would have expected even a year ago.
And QT is also increasing the supply of bonds out there.
So is Japan, China, and some other prior buyers.
So that I think there may be pressure in that 10-year rate to go up.
Inflation is stickier.
It's not a normal to have a 5 and 1/2 or 6% or even 7% 10-year rate.
And I don't look at that as a prediction.
I look at that as more like risk management.
Don't rule it out when you look at how you manage your company that rates can go a little bit higher.
I should also point out that spreads are still very low.
So credit spreads themselves can go up.
So it could be a little bit of a double whammy for borrowers.