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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. central bankers thought they should get more regulatory powers in return for providing cheap cash to Wall Street banks during the 2008 credit crisis, according to Federal Reserve transcripts released on Friday. Powerful investment banks such as Goldman Sachs (NYS:GS - News) and Morgan Stanley (NYS:MS - News) had access to a raft of measures to prop up markets during the 2008 credit meltdown, but the Federal Reserve had little say over them. "I am just a little worried about being taken advantage of here," Richard Fisher, head of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, said...

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., exhorted Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke to stimulate the economy before November through some form of quantitative easing or other monetary policy, which Bernanke said could create jobs. “Despite two false starts, we’re having a much rougher time than we ever imagined getting unemployment down,” Schumer told the Senate Banking Committee. “So get to work, Mr. Chairman.” Schumer said Bernanke needed to stimulate the economy because Congress refuses — “maybe after November we will,” he opined.“We will act in an apolitical, non-partisan manner to do what is necessary for the economy,” Bernanke replied. “We have said...

CONCORD, N.H. -- Congressman Ron Paul wasted no time here joking that "some Southern governor," (referring to his governor, Rick Perry, but not naming him), makes him look moderate. "I have never once said Bernanke committed treason," the Texas congressman said, chuckling. That was greeted with thunderous applause from the 600 supporters awaiting him at a campaign office opening.

The president of the New York Fed was put in an uncomfortable position on Friday morning as a crowd of Queens residents questioned him about food inflation. Bill Dudley, former head economist at Goldman Sachs, was asked when the last time he went to a super market was, and responded by telling the crowd that the price of some goods had actually fallen, using Apple’s recently released iPad 2 as an example, to the dismay and widespread disbelief of the crowd.

Recent comments from Atlanta Federal Reserve President Dennis Lockhart, combined with spiking oil prices, have led to speculation regarding future rounds of quantitative easing. Lockhart spoke recently at the National Association of Business Economics conference, commenting on rising oil prices and the potential for spikes to affect the economic recovery.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The United States can't fully recover from the worst recession in decades until hiring improves, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said Thursday. The economy is strengthening, and will likely grow at a faster pace this year as more confident consumers and companies spend more, Bernanke said in prepared remarks to the National Press Club. But he warned that the growth won't be strong enough to quickly drive down high unemployment, and it could take several years before it returns to more normal levels. "Until we see a sustained period of stronger job creation, we cannot consider the...

Some Loose Ends On FX Swaps..n a response letter sent to Alan Grayson, the Fed chairman has the following brief retort to the question of whether "the Federal Reserve- alone or in concert with the Treasury Department or any part of the government- ever taken any action with the purpose or effect of supporting the stock market or an individual stock": "The Federal Reserve has not intervened to support the stock market or an individual stock." Shocking. And we are confident that the fine people at Liberty 33 just sit all day, twiddling their thumbs now that the Fed is...

WASHINGTON — Protecting the U.S. central bank's independence is key for the economy, but at the same time, the Federal Reserve must become even more transparent, Chairman Ben Bernanke said Wednesday. At a swearing-in ceremony marking the start of his second four-year term, Mr. Bernanke said the central bank's independence serves important public objectives. "Critically, it allows the Federal Open Market Committee to make monetary policy in the longer-term economic interests of the American people, rather than in the service of short-term political imperatives," the Fed chief said. While the U.S. economy's return to growth is encouraging, Mr. Bernanke said...

His supporters argue that Mr Bernanke's unprecedented policies have ensured history will remember the self-styled 'Great Depression buff' differently. Mr Bernanke, 55, Tim Geithner, the US Treasury Secretary, and Hank Paulson, Geithner's predecessor under the Bush administration, have spent the past 12 months tackling a financial and economic blaze that threatened to topple the world's financial system last autumn. The crisis, whose symptoms first surfaced in America's sub-prime mortgage system two years ago, has since driven the global economy into its first global recession since World War II. "I did spend a lot of my career studying the Great Depression...