Yellen To Speak Tonight At UMass, But Don't Expect Her To Move The Market

The markets are moving on Thursday morning, with some anticipating comments from Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen.

Just don't expect her to raise any rates or move the markets.

Yellen will be a guest speaker at the University of Massachusetts as the school's 19th annual Philip Gamble Memorial Lecture. Since 1995, the series features a prominent economist each year. She is scheduled to speak at 5 p.m. ET.

Yellen's husband George Akerlof presented the Gamble Lecture in 2012. Economics professor and former department chair Gerald Epstein told the Daily Collegian, "We’re looking for somebody who typically is well known, somebody who has done great achievements as an economist and somebody we believe will give a talk that will be of broad interest to the University … and Janet Yellen meets all those criteria."

While the Fed chair will speak on macroeconomic issues, among other topics, don't anticipate any specifics on policy or interest rates.

“There is just not a lot she can say about monetary policy and what the Fed can do, it is such an uncertain environment,” Michael Moran, chief economist at Daiwa Capital Markets America, told Marketwatch.

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY was down about $1.17, or 0.75 percent, in Thursdays' pre-market session.

Posted In: NewsPreviewsEventsEconomicsFederal ReserveTrading IdeasGeorge AkerlofJanet Yellen
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