Charles Lieberman Quotes (20 Quotes)

Had this number been very high, the markets would have been quite confident the Fed would raise rates. The real question is whether they are going to pull the trigger on interest rates again, and my answer is no.

That's the time when a big number is most likely, mainly when we're coming out of a recession. At this stage of the business cycle, to be getting a 5 percent growth rate in productivity for a year is really very impressive.

It is very difficult to explain sometimes why it is important to keep things in moderation, why it is crucial for the Fed to be vigilant against inflation. What people have to remember is that the economy cannot grow in excess forever without causing problems, without stirring inflation and other issues.

These numbers are outstanding, ... Inflation still remains very well behaved.

No doubt housing activity was elevated over the winter because of very, very mild weather. One housing start in Syracuse, N.Y., in December is an awful lot. So we shouldn't be surprised by a big fall-off.

Investors worried this morning when the oil inventory report was released, but the market is taking a second look and interpreting the data more carefully now.

It's a very confused report (and) the message is still ambiguous. This could be the beginning of something substantial, but it's hard to accept a number like that at face value. We'll need more numbers to digest.

Inflation, on the surface, does not appear to be a concern, but it's obvious that prices for some items are rising, ... It's inevitable that when people are armed with fatter paychecks and when companies are spending more to produce goods and services, prices are going to rise.

Few Fed officials would be willing to prejudge the question, even if they have a personal judgment of how they expect the economy to perform. Rather, they'd prefer to wait for the data to inform them what is required of policy.

There is this simplistic notion around that because the yield curve is inverted, therefore, economic growth is going to slow down, but ... no consideration is given as to why the economy would slow down.

The Fed is not going to be troubled by a small miss (in the CPI). I don't think it's that big an issue, ... They're concerned that a falling stock market could hurt consumers sufficiently to curtail spending. That could be a problem.

That's actually good news. It means we're carrying less inventory and the production process is adjusting.

Inflation has been very soft for a number of years, and there's absolutely no reason to believe that's going to change any time in the near future.

People will be coming back from vacation and need to catch up with whatever's going on and they're going to be doing that right in front of the economic report on Friday, so none of that suggests that there should be any urgency to doing anything.

I think part of what has driven the market today are fluctuations in oil and interest rates and the bond market.

I suspect that interest rates must increase considerably more than is currently expected or has been built into forward markets.

It wouldn't be surprising if there was a little bit of a pullback in consumer spending in the first quarter as well because of the zero-percent financing in the fourth quarter, which makes for a very difficult comparison.

When a doctor administers medicine, he or she makes a judgment about the appropriate dosage in advance. The Fed has to make that judgment, but there's a chance they've already given out the right dosage and just need an appropriate amount of time for it t

As long as the productivity numbers are very good, the higher wage gains can be offset by higher productivity gains,

Analysts and economists remained uncertain whether Greenspan's latest comments would do more than puzzle investors. He's treading on very thin ice, ... When the Fed chairman says that the stock market is very expensive, the average investors is not going to be pleased.