[HN Gopher] Jay Powell traded during blackout period; failed to ...
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       Jay Powell traded during blackout period; failed to disclose most
       trade dates
        
       Author : itronitron
       Score  : 88 points
       Date   : 2022-02-07 21:22 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (occupythefed.substack.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (occupythefed.substack.com)
        
       | readthenotes1 wrote:
       | Rules for thee...
        
       | bmmayer1 wrote:
       | Bombshell, if true. Is there a less ideologically motivated
       | source reporting on this?
        
         | rfw300 wrote:
         | Yeah. This post certainly warrants further inquiry but our
         | baseline level of skepticism should be fairly high here.
        
         | munchler wrote:
         | I can't find anything about this from an actual news site.
         | Hopefully, they'll pick it up soon if it's for real.
        
           | hnuser847 wrote:
           | It's old news and was reported on by the MSM almost six
           | months ago. Just search for "Jerome Powell insider trading"
           | and a bunch of articles will pop up.
           | 
           | NY Times (October 4, 2021) -
           | https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/04/business/elizabeth-
           | warren...
           | 
           | NY Post (October 18, 2021) -
           | https://nypost.com/2021/10/18/fed-chair-powell-sold-
           | millions...
           | 
           | Bloomberg (October 19, 2021) - https://www.bloomberg.com/opin
           | ion/articles/2021-10-19/jerome...
           | 
           | Intelligencier (Jan 10, 2022) -
           | https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/01/washington-d-c-
           | has-a...
        
             | thawaya3113 wrote:
             | The 2 who were found to have made unethical trades were
             | removed.
             | 
             | Lawmakers have asked to investigate Powell's trades but
             | there is no evidence that they were unethical.
             | 
             | It might be fishy that some of his trades were days before
             | massive Wall Street swings. Hence the justifiable requests
             | for investigations, but considering Powell makes several
             | transactions a year, and there were many days with massive
             | swings in the market over the past couple of years, some of
             | those swings being uncomfortably close to trades are not
             | all that suspicious by themselves.
        
           | stickyricky wrote:
           | There was a time when government documents and quotes from
           | primary sources were considered evidence. What point would
           | materially change if it were distributed on CNN.com?
        
             | munchler wrote:
             | Most informed citizens don't have the time or expertise to
             | consume primary sources directly. It's extremely useful to
             | have a trusted news source do this for us, and then present
             | their findings in an easily understood article.
        
             | totalZero wrote:
             | The article makes almost zero effort to explain references
             | to primary sources. It just has a list of documents at the
             | end. I have no idea how to sort through and verify any of
             | the claims made by the author.
        
             | [deleted]
        
             | gojomo wrote:
             | Well, I don't know the reputation of
             | 'occupythefed.substack.com' from a long-history of
             | reporting. What they purport to be valid images, &
             | interpretations, of "government documents" may or may not
             | be. If & when other outlets with more legible reputations
             | (as well as known biases) pick up the same evidence, I'll
             | have more trust in this outlet's claims.
        
             | ketzo wrote:
             | It would have had to pass through a major news
             | organization's in-house fact checking apparatus.
             | 
             | I know CNN is pretty liberally biased, and blind trust in
             | news organizations is a bad idea.
             | 
             | But I think it's disingenuous to say that "government
             | documents and quotes from primary sources" on a tiny
             | Substack hold the same weight as information that goes out
             | on the nightly news.
        
         | thorncorona wrote:
         | I'm pretty skeptical of the reporting of this. The writing
         | itself is quite subpar and the sourcing is touchy to say the
         | least. I just picked a blurb at random.
         | 
         | > Despite his massive personal financial conflicts, Chair
         | Powell has acted with impunity to advantage the Wall Street
         | firms managing his investment fund holdings both before and
         | after the pandemic. Indeed, in late 2019, prior to the COVID-19
         | pandemic, Powell directed the Fed to engage in an unprecedented
         | emergency repo program that provided nearly $20 TRILLION in
         | cumulative loans to Wall Street, including ~$3.7 trillion to
         | Japan's Nomura Securities and ~$1.4 trillion to Germany's
         | Deutsche Bank trading arms. Industry experts have opined that
         | the program was in direct violation of the Dodd-Frank Act.24
         | 
         | > 24 https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/01/a-nomura-document-
         | may...
         | 
         | By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
         | 
         | > Mr. Martens' career spans four decades in publishing and
         | printing management, including magazine and music publishing
         | and the non-profit sector. Mr. Martens has received numerous
         | awards in publishing and graphic design.
         | 
         | > Ms. Martens worked on Wall Street for 21 years. The last
         | decade of her career was spent as an outspoken critic of Wall
         | Street's corrupt practices, its private justice system and the
         | repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act.
         | 
         | Except there's no listed institutions / non-profits /
         | publishers of note. If this is their bombshell article, and
         | this is the strongest source they can pull up, it's pretty
         | weak. Wall Street On Parade is also banned on reddit for vote
         | manipulation apparently.
         | 
         | Searching on Google for Wall Street on Parade leads to
         | r/GMEJungle r/Superstonk etc etc. Which leads me to believe
         | there's a 99% chance this article is a conspiracy theory
         | written by QQQanon.
        
           | tablespoon wrote:
           | > Chair Powell has acted with impunity
           | 
           | Chairs can't act, they can only be passively sat upon.
        
           | thawaya3113 wrote:
           | For context, DB's latest balance sheet has their total assets
           | at $1.3Tn. Net assets and shareholder equity on the balance
           | sheet are obviously far lower due to liabilities.
           | 
           | Point is, the apparent loan is greater than their entire
           | assets and much greater than all their liabilities.
           | 
           | Unless this 1 publicly traded bank is carrying trillions in
           | secret liabilities, why would they even borrow that much from
           | the Fed.
        
             | MatteoFrigo wrote:
             | TFA has no idea what they are talking about. They are just
             | adding the amount of rolled-over repos.
             | 
             | For example, assume that I lend you $1000 for one day. The
             | following day you pay me back $1000 plus interest, and I
             | lend you $1000 for another day. We keep going for 1000
             | days, rolling over the debt. TFA would say I have lent you
             | $1M. In reality, I have lent you $1000 for three years or
             | so.
        
               | MegaButts wrote:
               | > They are just adding the amount of rolled-over repos.
               | 
               | Why do you think this?
        
               | thawaya3113 wrote:
               | That's unbelievable and makes no sense.
               | 
               | Why would you cumulate overnight repos...
        
         | thakoppno wrote:
         | if true, resign?
        
       | vmception wrote:
       | This is beautiful, hope it doesn't affect his confirmation
       | though!
       | 
       | I think this has been going on for the last 100 years.
       | 
       | I don't want anybody else on the job.
        
         | newfriend wrote:
         | I think we need more diversity in the position.
        
       | thawaya3113 wrote:
       | I looked up the claim that Powell traded on the day of the
       | meeting of Dec 11, 2019.
       | 
       | And I don't know if this data is available and I'm certainly not
       | an expert, but the statement of that meeting (which was a Dec
       | 10-11, 2019 meeting) was to be released at 2pm EST.
       | 
       | Which still gives at least 2 hours for market close.
       | 
       | Considering he would have had blackout dates for 10 days prior,
       | it's completely natural for there to have been a string of
       | transaction activity right after the meeting.
       | 
       | Now, the transaction calendar doesn't give a time, so if the
       | transactions were made at 9AM that might be bad (although if
       | that's the case why did he wait till the second day of the
       | meeting).
       | 
       | In addition, the transactions were made by the Family Trust (it's
       | not clear if this is a blind trust or not, however).
        
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       (page generated 2022-02-07 23:02 UTC)