September 2025 FOMC Debrief

Hello my friends, today is September 17th and this is my September FOMC debrief. So I just finished watching T-Piles Presser and I thought it was a pretty good perhaps conference and a pretty interesting meeting so we have a bunch of stuff to talk about. However, as usual, let's first level set. Now between this meeting and the last meeting, we had a lot of stuff happen. On the labor market front, as we've been discussing, the labor market has been pretty disappointing. A whole bunch of jobs that we thought we had were revised away and the most recent jobs report was pretty disappointing, where jobs, you know, about 27,000 created lower than expectations. However, the unemployment rate remains pretty low at around 4.3%.

你好，朋友们，今天是9月17日，这是我对9月份FOMC会议的回顾。我刚刚看完T-Piles的新闻发布会，觉得会议还不错，也相当有趣，所以有很多内容需要讨论。不过，像往常一样，先来梳理一下背景情况。自上次会议以来，发生了很多事情。在劳动力市场方面，正如我们之前所讨论的，情况相当令人失望。我们之前以为存在的很多工作实际已被修正掉了，最近的就业报告也让人失望，新增就业岗位比预期少了大约27,000个。不过，失业率仍然很低，大约在4.3%上下。

Now looking on the inflation side, things really haven't been improving either. Taking a step back, it really looks like inflation is stuck at about 3%. And looking ahead, there doesn't seem to be a path for inflation to come down. Actually, there's a good argument that inflation could actually take up a little bit on account of tariffs. So if you're the Fed looking for 2% inflation and full employment, now you're kind of not doing very well on either mandate, so you're in a pretty tough position.

现在来看通货膨胀方面的情况，似乎也没有任何改善。退一步说，通胀率看起来确实停留在大约3%左右。展望未来，似乎没有路径能够让通胀下降。实际上，由于关税的原因，通胀可能还会略微上升。因此，如果你是美联储追求2%的通胀率和充分就业，那么你在这两个目标上都没有做到很好，因此处于一个相当艰难的境地。

Now we all knew since Chair Powell telegraphed that at Jackson Hall, that he would be cutting with today, so the market had fully priced in a 25 basis point cut. Now heading into this meeting, there were a few questions. Well first off, on the political front, we have the newly sworn in, distinguished Finto and Alam, Steve Meyer, and joining as the governor of Meyer in as his first meeting. We also have Governor Cook, who was fired by the press and reinstated by the Court of Appeals. So you had some interesting dynamics there.

现在我们都知道，自从鲍威尔主席在杰克逊霍尔的讲话中透露这一信息后，市场已经完全预期今天将会有一次25个基点的降息。在这次会议前，有一些问题需要关注。首先，在政治方面，我们有刚刚宣誓就职的Finto和Alam，两位杰出的成员，还有Steve Meyer，他是作为州长第一次参加会议的。此外，还有Cook州长，他曾被媒体解雇，但后来又被上诉法院恢复了职位。所以，这次会议上有一些有趣的动态。

I was unsure if there would be a lot of dissents. Maybe some people wanted 50 basis points. Maybe some people didn't want to cut it all. So that was a question mark. There's always, of course, on the margins, some people hoping for a 50 basis point cut. And of course, for me, of course, the biggest question was how the Fed would project its dot plots in 2026 and 2027. Now heading into this meeting, like we discussed, the market fully priced in 25 basis point cut and also, let's say, 25 for each of the meetings throughout the end of this year. However, the market also priced in a whole bunch of cuts for 2026, going as low as 2.9% in December of 2026.

我不确定会不会有很多不同意见。也许有些人希望降息50个基点，也许有些人根本不希望降息。所以这是个未定的问题。当然，总会有一些人在边缘希望降息50个基点。对我来说，最大的问题是美联储会如何预测2026年和2027年的利率点阵图。正如我们之前讨论的，市场在这次会议前已经完全预计会降息25个基点，并且假设今年剩下的每次会议都降25个基点。然而，市场还预期2026年会有多次降息，甚至在2026年12月降到2.9%。

That is actually much lower than the June dot plot. And so there's kind of a big disconnect where the market was thinking and where the Fed had guided towards in June. And as I wrote about a Monday, my perception was that the market would be forced to move to the bid hawker's to the Fed a little bit after today. So those were the questions heading into the meeting today. Now at the meeting, again, immediately we got the 25 basis point cut as expected. No 50 basis point cut. That was always very, very unlikely.

这实际上比6月的点阵图低得多。因此，市场的预期与美联储在6月份的指引之间存在很大的差距。正如我在周一所写的，我认为在今天之后，市场将被迫略微向美联储的强硬立场靠拢。这些就是今天会议前需要解答的问题。在会议上，我们确实如预期一样得到了25个基点的降息，没有出现50个基点的降息，这种情况一直以来极不可能出现。

And we did get a dissent. And that dissent, of course, comes from Governor Marin who wanted 50 basis points. No other dissents. So it looks like the FOMC as a whole is still pretty cohesive on that front. Now more interesting thing is looking at the dot plot. Now looking at the dot plot, no, the dot plot really didn't really change that much between this meeting and the last meeting. Looks like the Fed basically just penciled in an extra cut. So again, the dot plot is much more hawkish than was priced into the market.

我们确实收到了一个反对意见，而这个反对意见来自Marin理事，他希望提高利率50个基点。其他人没有反对意见。所以整体来看，联邦公开市场委员会（FOMC）在这方面还是比较一致的。更有趣的是看点阵图。点阵图在这次会议和上次会议之间并没有太大变化。美联储似乎只额外安排了一次利率下调。因此，点阵图显示的立场比市场预期的更加鹰派。

And on the actually the economic forecast front looks like the Fed marked down their unemployment rate a little bit. So a little bit better growth and marked up their inflation a little bit. So inflation a little bit worse. So that's kind of how they're looking at it. One of course, very interesting thing is that when you break out the dot plot as to where the committee members stand with respect to rates at the end of 2025, you notice a whole bunch of them are clustered around. I'll say 4% or something like that.

在经济预测方面，美联储似乎将失业率的预期稍微下调了一点，这意味着经济增长稍微好一些。同时，他们也稍微上调了通胀预期，这意味着通胀会稍微严重一些。这就是他们目前的看法。当然，有一件非常有趣的事情是，当你查看美联储委员会成员关于2025年底利率的预期点阵图时，会发现很多成员的预期聚集在大约4%左右。

And there's this one dot that is very, very low. That is actually looking for 50 basis point cut in each of the last three meetings this year. And so I think we can all guess who that is. Okay. So going to the press conference again, I think there are two things that really sit out to me. Well actually, I'll say three things. Well first off, what's this rationale for cutting rates today? I mean, you know, I mean, yeah. So what does he say? So Paul basically says that the labor market is not as strong as he thought it was.

有一个非常低的点，这个点实际上是在预测今年最后三次会议中每次会降息50个基点。我想我们都能猜到这是谁。好的，再次回到新闻发布会，有两件事情给我留下了深刻印象。其实，我应该说三件事。首先，今天降息的理由是什么？我指的是，你知道的，对吧。那么他说了什么呢？鲍威尔基本上是说劳动力市场并不像他认为的那样强劲。

Over the past few meetings, Paul had repeatedly asserted that the labor market is doing really well. I mean, looking at the unemployment rate. And so his focus was mostly on inflation. Now he mentioned that looking at the revised data, the labor market really doesn't look as good as he thought. And so, you know, the risks are a bit more to side. And now he can't really just all think that much on inflation. And he also suggests that that inflation is not as worrisome as he used to think. So I take that to mean that inflation is probably going to be stuck at around 3%. It's probably not going to get worse to 4 or 5, 6%. Now during the pandemic, it was super high. That was totally unacceptable. But my sense is that 3% inflation is actually okay to him.

在过去的几次会议中，保罗反复强调劳动力市场表现非常好。他主要是看失业率。因此，他主要关注的是通货膨胀。但现在，他提到查看修正后的数据后，发现劳动力市场并不像他之前认为的那么好。因此，他认为风险有所增加，现在也不能只关注通货膨胀问题。他还表示，通货膨胀并不像他之前认为的那么令人担忧。我觉得这意味着通货膨胀可能会维持在大约3%左右，可能不会恶化到4%、5%或6%。在疫情期间，通货膨胀非常高，那是完全不可接受的。但我感觉3%的通货膨胀对他来说其实是可以接受的。

The second thing that I thought was super interesting is how he perceived the upcoming job numbers. So as we mentioned, last month, we only created 27,000 jobs. And actually in June, after revisions, we actually had a negative job number. So his perspective was that because a lot of the weakness, the perceived weakness in the labor market, it really is just due to immigration. It's a plan to demand dynamics over there. So he thought that a breakeven job growth because of our reduced immigration is between 0 to 50,000. So any number, according to this perspective, any number of we get from the NFP report going forward if it's between 0 and 50,000, it's probably okay because we should expect a low job growth because we have lower population growth.

第二件我觉得特别有趣的事情是他如何看待即将发布的就业数据。正如我们提到的，上个月我们仅新增了27,000个就业岗位。实际上，在修正后的数据中，6月份的就业数据其实是负数。他的看法是，由于劳动力市场的疲软，其实主要是因为移民问题。这是供需动态之间的计划结果。根据他的观点，由于移民减少，保持就业增长的平衡点是在0到50,000之间。因此如果未来我们从NFP报告中看到的就业数据在0到50,000之间，从这个角度来看，可能是可以接受的，因为我们应该预期就业增长较低，这与人口增长放缓有关。

Now, when he, burger, who is a smart person who focuses on employment, also suggested that the kind of just look at the unemployment rate to kind of derive what the breakeven number is. So that's kind of a headline number. It's not super important. Really what matters is the unemployment rate. And I think that makes sense as well. In any case, based on where the unemployment rate is today and based on the job growth numbers we've seen over the past few months, it seems that it's not going to be a real-life. It's correct that the economy, because of low population growth, these low job numbers actually actually don't seem to be super concerning.

现在，他——伯格，一个专注于就业的聪明人，也建议仅仅通过失业率来推算盈亏平衡点。这只是一个大致的指标，其实并不太重要。真正重要的是失业率，我认为这一点也合理。无论如何，根据当前的失业率以及过去几个月的就业增长数据来看，低人口增长导致这些较低的就业数字似乎并没有特别令人担忧的迹象。

Though, of course, if you look at other things like wages and so forth, it does seem the labor market continues to weaken. All right, so that means that actually a pretty hawkish perspective, really, it means that the Fed is not going to be super worried about the lower job growth numbers going forward. And another thing that I thought was pretty interesting, he mentioned was his perspective on tariffs. Now, we've been talking about tariffs for months. And initially, what I was telling you guys is that just looking at the past, what happened in 2017, 2018 is that the distributors, like the middlemen, they ate the tariffs as profit through lower profits and they really weren't passed through the consumers.

当然，如果你看看工资等其他因素，劳动力市场似乎的确在继续走弱。所以，这实际上意味着一个比较鹰派的观点，也就是说美联储不会过于担心未来新增就业数据的下降。另外，我觉得还有一件事挺有趣，他提到了对关税的看法。我们已经讨论关税好几个月了。最初，我告诉你们的是，通过了解过去发生的事情，比如2017年和2018年的情况，我们可以看到分销商，也就是中间商，通过减少利润将关税吸收掉了，而并没有将其转嫁给消费者。

And that's really what happened based on studies looking at hundreds of thousands of prices in 2018 and 2019. And Paul basically are saying right now that, yeah, that's kind of what's happening right now. All these distributors, they're eating the costs, eating the tariffs. They plan on passing this on to consumers, but they're having trouble too. So he's saying that pass through could be very slow and very low. So at the moment, there really just doesn't seem to have been a very big impact from tariffs on inflation. So that could come going forward. But if the economy weakens and the FOMC is projecting below trend growth, and I also am quite negative on the economy, so that won't be passed through and it will continue to be eaten by the distributors.

根据2018年和2019年的研究，研究人员查看了成千上万个价格，以揭示实际发生的情况。而保罗现在基本上是在说，的确，这就是目前正在发生的情况。所有的分销商都在吸收成本和关税，他们本来打算将这些成本转嫁给消费者，但目前遇到了困难。所以他说，这种成本转嫁可能会非常缓慢和有限。目前来看，关税对通货膨胀的影响似乎并不大。虽然将来可能会产生影响，但如果经济走弱，加上美联储预计经济增长低于趋势，而我对经济也持悲观看法，那么这些成本就不会被转嫁出去，分销商将继续自行承担这些成本。

So it looks like everyone who's afraid of massive inflation from tariffs does not have to be afraid. I think that's all right now. So going forward, I think we're just looking more closely on the employment market and that's going to be what happens. Again, the market is fully pricing in another rate cut at the next meeting and another rate cut in December. And beyond that, though, I think we just have to see who the composition of the FOMC is because personnel changes, either what happens with Governor Cook or who the next Fed chair is. And of course, will the Notcher Powell will leave after his term of Fed chair is over? Those are the questions that will shape the rates market for next year. All right. So I prepared, talk to you guys on Saturday.

所以看起来担心关税导致大规模通货膨胀的人不需要害怕。我觉得目前就是这样。往前看，我们可能会更密切关注就业市场，看接下来会发生什么变化。市场已经充分预期下次会议会再次降息，而且十二月也会再降息。除此之外，我们还需要观察联邦公开市场委员会（FOMC）的成员构成，因为人事变动，比如库克总裁的去留或下任美联储主席会是谁。当然，鲍威尔主席在任期结束后是否会离任也是一个重要问题。这些都会影响明年的利率市场。好了，就说这些，周六再跟大家聊。