As the saying goes, “needs must when the devil drives”. We have no problem understanding the Fed’s decision to announce (at 7pm last night) that the details of the BTFP program needed to be altered. The problem was the overly juicy arbitrage, whereby banks could use the BTFP window to flip cash from the Fed into the RRP and pocket the not-insubstantial difference. We were impressed by the chutzpah involved in arbitraging two Fed facilities!
Read more →