Yellen Heads for March Crossroads as Market Urges Policy Detour

Janet Yellen has her eyes on the road.

After the Federal Reserve chair assured U.S. lawmakers that the U.S. economy is strong enough to weather a gradual tightening of monetary policy, she is set to spend the next four weeks measuring the bumps that financial-market turbulence put on the path to higher interest rates.

With jobless data signaling full employment and inflation expected to rise toward 2 percent over the medium term, the March 15-16 meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee will be a test of how data dependent policy makers are prepared to be.

Since the Fed raised interest rates for the first time in almost a decade in December, Yellen and her colleagues have stressed that the pace of future tightening will be determined by incoming data about the economic outlook.

While those readings don’t undermine the case for higher borrowing costs, tighter financial conditions and market volatility reflecting uncertainty over global economic prospects are risks that may stay Yellen’s hand.

The mantra Yellen recited frequently during her testimony to the House Financial Services Committee and the Senate Banking Committee last week was that monetary policy is “by no means” on a preset course. Her comments upstage the minutes of the Jan. 26-27 meeting the Fed will release on Wednesday, though these will still provide important clues about the balance of views within the committee.