Fed Chair: ‘We Have the Ability to Create Money Digitally’

The Chairman of the United States Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, recently spoke about measures taken during the financial crisis, with many on Twitter viewing his remarks as evidence of the need for cryptocurrency.

In a Sunday interview that aired on 60 Minutes, Powell spoke to news anchor Scott Pelley, saying the Fed had essentially flooded the economy with money printed in response to the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling in March and investors turning away from U.S. Treasurys.

According to Powell, the Fed can print U.S. dollars digitally in addition to creating physical bills:

"As a central bank, we have the ability to create money digitally. And we do that by buying Treasury Bills or bonds for other government guaranteed securities. And that actually increases the money supply. We also print actual currency and we distribute that through the Federal Reserve banks."

When asked by Pelley whether the Fed could do more during the pandemic, Powell said it was “not out of ammunition by a long shot,” stating the bank would enlarge its existing lending programs for “as long as we need to.”

Proving the need for Bitcoin?

Many members of crypto Twitter were quick to pounce on the Fed Chairman’s remarks. Podcaster Marty Bent said that such inflationary measures like “[flooding] the system with money” were harder to do with a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin (BTC).

“We print it digitally.”The “we” here is five people voting on changes to monetary policy within the Federal Reserve system during FOMC meetings.5 out of 330,000,000. That’s all it takes to change US monetary policy.Much harder with bitcoin.Think.pic.twitter.com/5C1io1ijOO

— Marty Bent (@MartyBent) May 18, 2020

Others such as crypto enthusiast Nick Chong were more concise: 

"That's a weird way of saying ‘buy Bitcoin'"

Bitcoin decoupling from traditional markets?

The type of actions that Powell discussed can have an immediate impact on traditional markets. However, Cointelegraph has reported that BTC’s recent bullish behavior suggests the cryptocurrency is far less correlated with stocks than it was at the start of the pandemic.