(Reuters) – For the second time in less than a decade, the Federal Reserve is getting ready to launch a thorny debate over how and when to sunset a massive asset-purchase program that helped cushion an economy battered by crisis but left it with a mountain of bonds that may linger on its balance sheet for years to come.
Officials’ opening discussion about how and when to taper the U.S. central bank’s $120 billion in monthly bond purchases looks set to occur at this week’s two-day policy meeting and will take place against a dramatically different backdrop than the last time around, when they were more skittish about owning such a substantial slice of the bond market.
“I think the discussion will start” at the Fed’s policy meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday, said Robin Brooks, chief economist at the Institute of International Finance. “I think it will start very, very cautiously,” he added, and Fed Chair Jerome Powell won’t be in any rush to conclude it.
The risk of another “taper tantrum” – the market ruckus that erupted eight years ago when Fed policymakers first broached the notion of scaling back their bond-buying after the 2007-2008 financial crisis – appears remote this time. Fed officials have posted plenty of trail markers for the path to tapering, and key officials have signaled the discussion is…
