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US Economy Not 'Out of Woods' Yet: Bernanke
Wednesday, 7 Apr 2010 by Reuters

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said on Wednesday the U.S. economy still faces significant headwinds, including a housing sector that has yet to recover convincingly and an ailing employment market.

In a speech that suggested the central bank chief was in no rush to begin raising interest rates, Bernanke outlined a number of challenges to the country's growth outlook.

"Many Americans are still grappling with unemployment or foreclosure, or both,'' Bernanke said in prepared remarks to the Dallas Regional Chamber of Commerce. "We are far from being out of the woods.

In particular, Bernanke flagged continuing weakness in housing as a danger to the recovery, which he nonetheless said would be sustainable enough to bring down the unemployment rate slowly over time.

''We have yet to see evidence of a sustained recovery in the housing market," he said.

Against that backdrop, the Fed chairman saw no immediate reason to be worried about inflation, which he characterized as ''well controlled."

In addition, inflation expectations, which Fed officials have singled out as a crucial guidepost for policy, appear to be stable, Bernanke said, both as measured by market indicators and surveys.

In response to the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, the Fed slashed interest rates close to zero and undertook a host of emergency measures in an effort to thaw frozen credit markets.

Some investors are betting the central bank could begin tightening policy in the second half of this year, but others believe lingering economic fragility will keep the Fed on hold until at least 2011.

Bernanke said the Fed's ability to prevent future crises will hinge in part on the development of a resolution authority that would allow regulators to break up or wind down large financial institutions that run into trouble in an orderly fashion.

He said the Fed had already made significant changes to its regulatory approach to reflect lessons learned from the crisis.

Separately, U.S. interest rates need to remain "exceptionally low" for some time to support a still fragile economy and create more jobs, New York Federal Reserve Bank President William Dudley said on Wednesday.

"We are not getting the job gains we would like to see," Dudley said at a luncheon event sponsored by the Economic Club of New York.

"What that tells us is monetary policy has to remain on an easy setting," he said. The benchmark federal funds rate "needs to remain exceptionally low for an extended period," he added.

Minutes from the Fed's last policy meeting, released on Tuesday, suggested the central bank could leave interest rates at record lows for even longer than investors had expected if the economic outlook worsens or inflation drops.

Dudley also said that inflation remains well-anchored but stressed this could change should inflation expectations start to change

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