The WSJ reporter known as the Fed whisperer

Jen Wieczner of New York Magazine profiles Wall Street Journal reporter Nick Timiraos, who covers the Federal Reserve.

Wieczner writes, “The extra attention on Timiraos started a little more than a year ago, when he correctly reported (nearly two months in advance) that the Fed would begin winding down its pandemic stimulus in November. But the buzz began in earnest on the eve of the Fed’s mid-June meeting. Timiraos wrote an article suggesting the Fed was ‘Likely to Consider 0.75-Percentage-Point Rate Rise’ when the consensus bet among investors around the world was for just a half-point hike. At the time, the Fed had been in a blackout period, in which its officials do not speak with reporters, for over a week. But Timiraos was right: The Fed subsequently hiked rates three-quarters of a point. ‘I independently confirmed that it was essentially a leak to him,’ says the journalist who covered the Fed. ‘And that wouldn’t go to anybody else.’ Since then, Timiraos has accurately called each of the Fed’s next moves, writing in July that the Fed was ‘preparing to lift’ rates — at a moment many observers were expecting a pause — and, in September, that it was ‘on a path to raise’ them once again by three-quarters of a point, swaying Wall Street odds-makers in that direction. On September 21, of course, three quarters of a point was exactly what Powell delivered.

“Timiraos, who has worked at WSJ since graduating from Georgetown and covered the Fed for the past five years, has become a kind of economic indicator in his own right — his stories and Twitter feed are a must-read for Fed watchers the world over.”

Read more here.