President Donald Trump has indicated that he will announce the name of the new Fed Reserve’s Chair on Friday, while speaking at the premiere for “Melania”, the film about the first lady. “I will be declaring the name of Fed’s Chair in the morning as he has not settled on one choice yet”.
He further added that the process of finding a Chair to succeed Jerome Powell is about to finish now. The current Chair Jerome Powell, whose term will expire in May, has received heavy criticism from Trump’s administration for holding the interest rates.
Trump has been placing excessive pressure on the Fed’s current chair to reduce the interest rates, which has placed him at odds with the Federal Reserve’s traditionally autonomous policymaking role.
The process to replace Powell was initiated in September with 11 candidates, including economists, current and past Fed officials, and Wall Street investment professionals. The list of possible candidates has been whittled down to five, and then four candidates, and Scott Bessent, Treasury Secretary, has screened the qualifying candidates.
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The final four candidates for this position are National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, current Fed Governor Christopher Waller, and BlackRock chief investment officer for fixed income Rick Rieder.
The prediction markets have been wagering on who will get the job. Hassett led the list for some time, then Warsh, and now Rieder for the previous days. Nevertheless, this option was flipped on Thursday evening with Kalshi now placing Warsh as a prohibitive 80% favourite.
Trump explained that the selected candidate is somebody who could have been there a few years ago. Warsh is known to have been in the running for the position of running back in 2017 when Trump decided to nominate Powell.
A source has also confirmed to CNBC that Warsh was seen in the White House on Thursday, but the White House official dismissed this speculation.
Finally, Kush Desai, White House Spokesperson stated that Trump will announce the name of the selected candidate and the process of selection at an adequate stage.
Powell has not confirmed if he will continue as chair after his term expires in May and has declined to answer any questions about it. He has an additional two years left in his current governor’s term
