🇺🇸 Fed chair Warsh’s first Jackson Hole speech as Fed chair was less a rate signal than a diagnosis. He kept the 2% target fixed and said the better summer CPI and PCE prints do not prove underlying inflation has turned. If that path is not clear and fast enough, he said the Fed still has work to do. The important line was that financial conditions do not look particularly restrictive while the economy still looks resilient, the labor market is stable, and AI-related investment is doing real work. Housing remains the soft spot. He would not map September. He argued regular forward guidance has outlived its usefulness and that markets should not treat one mountain speech as a decision. July’s 9-3 hold, PCE still around 3.7%, and years of inflation above target are the backdrop. Sticky prices, a solid economy, and policy that does not look tight. Most of the X influencers took this as hawkish, but they forgot that the Fed is literally saying, ZERO forward guidance.(Seth)