Daily Agenda: Yellen Speech Takes Center Stage

At 10 a.m. this morning,Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellenwill address the economics crowd at the Jackson Hole Symposium with a speech that is expected to lay out a better understanding of the central bank’s policy in the months and quarters ahead. Currently, derivatives markets linked to interest rates favor a rate hike before the end of the year by a ratio of more than 50 percent with a possibility of a hike as early as September priced in. Fed policymakers have a well-deserved reputation for managing expectations carefully, with nuanced and often vague language. Given the title of Yellen’s address, “The Federal Reserve’s Monetary Policy Toolkit,” it is entirely possible that Yellen will spend most of her time on the podium discussing how, rather than when, the central bank will act. For speculators and traders, the timing of the next hike is critical. For allocators, the more pressing concern is how steep the series of rate hikes will turn out to be. For now, the calm presented by the yield curve suggests that long-term investors are untroubled by prospects of a 25-basis-point increase, since a historically low-yield environment appears set to persist for years.

Striking Bolivian miners kill government official.周四，玻利维亚副副部长Rodolfo Illanes被潘杜罗的矿工袭击了潘杜罗，而他旅行与他们的领导者见面，后来被杀。政府已谴责袭击和承诺的迅速正义。这一周，由于冲突开始，17名警察受伤，至少有两名抗议者被杀死。全国矿业合作社联合会联合会，前任埃沃莫拉莱总统行政管理人员组织了罢工，以提取政府的让步，以便放松环境控制，并允许私营公司工会。玻利维亚的矿业目前由近年来商品价格下跌导致的小型合作社主导。

Deflation still stalks Japanese economy.公布的数据由日本的圣atistics Bureau on Friday indicated that inflation remains anemic with core consumer price levels declining by 0.5 percent year-over-year in July to reach a three-year low reading. Tokyo specific data for August, also released today, saw core levels decline by 0.4 percent versus the same month last year, a leading indicator suggesting nationwide CPI measures will remain under pressure in the near term. The reaction to the news in currency markets was muted as many traders saw the data as more confirmation that the Bank of Japan will pursue additional policy action at next month’s meeting.

State pensions face massive shortfall between assets and liabilities.In a report issued on Thursday, the Pew Charitable Trusts estimated that U.S. state-managedpension fundsfaced a shortfall of roughly $1 trillion for fiscal 2015 after market returns were weaker than 2014. The report concludes that state policymakers can no longer rely on investment returns to make up the shortfall with yields remaining near historic lows and alternative-asset managers underperforming. In addition to scaling back or scrapping entirely benefits for new and current workers—an approach already being implemented in some states—the Pew analysis concludes that tax increases may be required to meet obligations.

Rousseff弹劾开始了。The final leg of the impeachment process began today forBrazilian President Dilma Rousseff，参议院试验预计下周结束。随着诉讼程序在巴西利亚进行，媒体网点的非正式民意调查的迹象表明，大多数巴西人都辞去了Rousseff的出发。随着联邦赤字达到历史悠久的高位，失业率上升，持续经济衰退和持续的Petrobras政治腐败批评，巴西人们似乎准备改变了数百名政府官员。