Ben Bernanke’s Mortgage Rate Exit Strategy

Ben Bernanke will be testifying before the House Finance Servicing Committee regarding the Fed’s exit strategy.   From his prepared testimony:

All told, the Federal Reserve purchased $300 billion of Treasury securities and currently anticipates concluding purchases of $1.25 trillion of agency MBS and about $175 billion of agency debt securities at the end of March.

What this means is to you and me is that we will start seeing rates increase well before the end of March as the markets will adjust before the Fed stops their support of keeping mortgage rates artificially low.

This is nothing new.  It will be interesting to hear what else Mr. Bernanke has to say to the Committee today.

And for your morning viewing pleasure, how about this clip from Snagglepuss who’s famous for his exits:

I can’t believe I used to watch this stuff while eating my sugary cereal in the morning!