BREAKDOWN: What Jerome Powell’s Second Term Means for Bitcoin
CoinDesk Podcast Network
CoinDesk
4.8 • 689 Ratings
🗓️ 23 November 2021
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The much-memed Fed chairman officially gets a second term with the Biden Administration.
This episode is sponsored by NYDIG.
This week, after months of speculation, President Joe Biden has named Jerome Powell to a second term as Federal Reserve chairman. His most likely alternate, Lael Brainard, was promoted to vice chairwoman. On today’s episode of “The Breakdown,” NLW looks at why full employment remains at the centerpiece of the Fed agenda even as the nominations herald a narrative pivot on inflation. He also discusses the likely impacts to bitcoin, stablecoins and crypto more broadly.
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NYDIG, the institutional-grade platform for bitcoin, is making it possible for thousands of banks who have trusted relationships with hundreds of millions of customers, to offer Bitcoin. Learn more at NYDIG.com/NLW.
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“The Breakdown” is written, produced by and features Nathaniel Whittemore aka NLW, with editing by Rob Mitchell, research by Scott Hill and additional production support by Eleanor Pahl. Adam B. Levine is our executive producer and our theme music is “Countdown” by Neon Beach. The music you heard today behind our sponsor is “Dark Crazed Cap” by Isaac Joel. Image credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images News, modified by CoinDesk.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Bitcoin in particular, but also some other cryptos, are increasingly perceived as safe haven assets, |
| 0:06.1 | where their fixed supplies or predictable inflation schedules stand in contrast to central bank fiat money. |
| 0:12.9 | And as many people as there are that dismiss that take, the people who believe it, which is a growing number, |
| 0:17.7 | set a price floor that increases over time. Fed policy could have very |
| 0:22.2 | different and potentially countervailing impacts, given that some are seeing Bitcoin and crypto as a |
| 0:27.8 | safe haven, and for some, it remains just a risk asset alongside any other risky bet. |
| 0:34.1 | Welcome back to The Breakdown with me, NLW. |
| 0:43.2 | It's a daily podcast on macro, Bitcoin, and the big picture power shifts remaking our world. |
| 0:49.8 | The breakdown is sponsored by Nidig and produced and distributed by CoinDesk. |
| 0:57.8 | What's going on, guys? It is Tuesday, November 23rd, and yesterday, after tons of waiting, |
| 1:07.2 | we finally got the decision that the markets have been waiting for about who will be the next Federal Reserve chair. |
| 1:13.0 | Now, the two candidates going into this were, of course, Jerome Powell, the man who'd been at the helm of the Fed for the last four years. The pros for Powell was that it would show a steady hand at the |
| 1:19.5 | wheel. There would be continuity from this crazy COVID era we just lived through. It would show that it |
| 1:25.6 | wasn't a partisan thing for the Biden administration. |
| 1:29.1 | From a political perspective, it would likely be an easy confirmation, and markets were almost |
| 1:33.9 | sure to like the option that they already knew. Now, the other candidate that was in consideration |
| 1:39.6 | was Lael Braynard, who was already on the Federal Reserve Board, and who represented new blood. |
| 1:44.8 | She's liked by the progressive wing for the perception of being harder on corporate regulation. |
| 1:49.8 | Now, there had been an absolute ton of speculation over the last months, really, but certainly |
| 1:55.0 | the last few weeks on who Biden would ultimately choose. |
| 1:58.5 | And when push came to shove, it was Jerome Powell. Yes, Jerome Powell is |
| 2:02.8 | getting a second term as Fed chair, and Braynard is being promoted to vice chair. This is one of the |
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