CFS Monetary Measures for August 2020

Today we release CFS monetary and financial measures for August 2020. CFS Divisia M4, which is the broadest and most important measure of money, grew by 29.8% in August 2020 on a year-over-year basis versus 30.8% in July.

For Monetary and Financial Data Release Report:
http://www.centerforfinancialstability.org/amfm/Divisia_Aug20.pdf

For more information about the CFS Divisia indices and the data in Excel:
http://www.centerforfinancialstability.org/amfm_data.php

Bloomberg terminal users can access our monetary and financial statistics by any of the four options:

1) ALLX DIVM
2) ECST T DIVMM4IY
3) ECST –> ‘Monetary Sector’ –> ‘Money Supply’ –> Change Source in top right to ‘Center for Financial Stability’
4) ECST S US MONEY SUPPLY –> From source list on left, select ‘Center for Financial Stability’

CFTC Advisory Committee Recommends Regulatory Actions to Address Climate Risk

A subcommittee of the CFTC Market Risk Advisory Committee (“MRAC”) recommended that U.S. regulators take action to address the risks that climate change poses to the U.S. financial system.

The recommendations came in a report, titled Managing Climate Risk in the U.S. Financial System, issued by the MRAC Climate-Related Market Risk Subcommittee. CFTC Commissioner Rostin Behnam, the sponsor of the MRAC, suggested the report could be used by “policymakers, regulators, and stakeholders” to begin a process of “taking thoughtful and intentional steps toward building a climate-resilient financial system that prepares our country for the decades to come.”

The report presents 53 recommendations to mitigate risks to financial markets posed by climate change and concludes, among other things, that:

climate change poses a “major risk to the stability of the U.S. financial system and to its ability to sustain the American economy”;

regulators “must” recognize that climate changes poses “serious emerging risks” and should move “urgently and decisively to measure, understand, and address these risks”;

existing law provides U.S. financial regulators with significant authority that could be used to begin addressing financial climate-related risk;

regulators can help promote the role of financial markets as providers of solutions to climate-related risks; and

financial innovation is required to manage climate risk and to facilitate the flow of capital in order to help “accelerate net-zero transition and increase economic opportunity.”

The report was approved 34-0 by the subcommittee’s membership. The CFTC also posted statements from participants on the subcommittee: (1) Cargill, (2) Citi, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley, (3) CME Group, (4) ConocoPhillips and (5) Vanguard.

LOFCHIE COMMENTARY

The job of the CFTC is to regulate markets in which market participants can agree to transfer risk between them. If there exists a sufficient number of market participants to create a liquid market in which they can buy and sell “climate risk,” such risk would be measured by these participants. Then the CFTC should do its best to regulate that market so that it operates efficiently and transparently. It is not the job of the CFTC, as a regulatory agency, to advocate as to carbon taxes (either for or against), or for that matter, local insurance markets, corporate disclosures, or corporate governance. That job is entrusted to other regulators. When regulators pursue these other objectives, they deviate from their mission and their real task.

With the NFL football season now upon us, it is appropriate for the CFTC to consider the words of the greatest football coach of all time: “Do Your Job.”