Global Central Bankers Line Up to Support Fed Chair. Markets, Not So Much.

Stocks hit fresh record highs, Treasury yields barely budged and the market’s benchmark volatility gauge moved lower throughout Monday’s session following news of a criminal probe by the U.S. Department of Justice into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. It was hardly the reaction analysts and investors expected from the unprecedented attack on the independence of the world’s most important central bank. It was also in stark contrast to the public statements of several former Fed chairs, who said the move had “no place in the United States, whose greatest strength is the rule of law, which is at the foundation of our economic success” in a letter published on Monday.