Implications for Utilities and Regulators
Talina Mathews is CFO of Big Rivers Electric Corp. Ted Thomas is the Founder of Energize Strategies. David Springe is Executive Director of NASUCA. William Emmons is Lead Economist of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Moderator Michael Sykuta is a Professor at the University of Missouri.
The University of Missouri's Financial Research Institute held its Hot Topic Hotline webinar on Inflation, Monetary Policy, and Interest Rates: what they mean for utilities and regulators, the first day of December. The timely discussion had its genesis in the past year's highest inflation rates in forty years.
Also, the Federal Reserve has raised its benchmark interest rate by 375 basis points (3.75 percentage points) since the beginning of 2022 in efforts to cool inflationary pressures. While recent reports suggest inflation may be slowing from its peak, inflation remains well above the Fed's long-term target rate of 2.0 to 2.5 percent.
The experts talked about what the future might hold for the economy as well as the energy and utilities industries. Listen in as panelists including Big Rivers Electric Corp. CFO Talina Mathews, Energize Strategies Founder Ted Thomas, NASUCA Executive Director David Springe, and Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis Lead Economist William Emmons, grappled with the big issues.
Lead Economist, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, William Emmons: These are my own views, not those of the Fed, although our president, Jim Bullard, has been in the forefront of discussing what the Fed needs to be doing in the context of what we're talking about today.