Jerome Powell’s appetite for a faster tapering of Federal Reserve stimulus is casting him in a role financial markets haven’t seen since 2018: hawk.
Stocks slid, short-term interest rates rose and measures of equity volatility surged Tuesday after the central bank chairman warned that elevated inflation could justify ending asset purchases sooner than planned. Buffeted also by anxiety around the coronavirus, the S&P 500 just endured its worst stretch of turbulence in more than a year.
