In the $12 trillion global bond market, a key source of funding for Wall Street's daily operations, mounting pressure is prompting growing calls for the Federal Reserve to take stronger measures to alleviate the pressure. Firms including Bank of America and Barclays have warned that the Fed may need to take measures such as increasing lending in the short-term market or directly purchasing securities to inject funds into the banking system and ease pressure on overnight interest rates. Gennadiy Goldberg, head of interest rate strategy at TD Securities, said, "Given the recent pressure, the Fed seems to be only gradually changing its balance sheet policy. Some investors believe that the Fed's actions may be too slow to prevent reserves from becoming scarce." Despite the Fed's recent announcement that it will stop reducing its holdings of U.S. Treasury securities on December 1, the pressure persists, and some worry that ending the government gridlock will not fully resolve the problem. (Jinshi)
