MNI BRIEF: Fed MBS QE Successfully Providing Support-Brainard

Federal Reserve Board Governor Lael Brainard said Tuesday the Fed's monthly purchases of mortgage-backed securities have been successful at providing broad support to households and businesses, seemingly dismissing the need to consider adjusting purchases as other officials have recently suggested.

"Generally speaking, we believe we are accomplishing that goal of providing more accommodative financial conditions to support households and businesses through putting downward pressure on longer-term interest rates," she said. "In that sense the composition is effective in achieving our monetary policy."

Other current and former Fed officials, including Rob Kaplan of the Dallas Fed, Eric Rosengren of the Boston Fed, and Esther George of the Kansas City Fed, have suggested a discussion of possible adjusting the purchases, given the hot housing market and stability concerns. Brainard, in her remarks at the Economic Club of New York, pushed back, saying, "Underwriting terms are just much stronger, and, generally, household balance sheets are much healthier, so it's, it's really not comparable to that period in 2008, that some people are raising."