Macroeconomist Zoltan Pozsar, a Managing Director in the Investment Strategy and Research department at Credit Suisse, discusses with hosts Jeffrey Sherman and Samuel Lau, among other topics, the possibilities of “ugly versus beautiful” quantitative tightening by the Federal Reserve (13:18); his expectation of scant demand for Treasuries by FX hedge buyers, foreign central banks and domestic bank portfolios once those assets start rolling off the Fed’s balance sheet (15:44); a vulnerability of the U.S. banking system to mobile retail deposits (19:36) and commodity price spikes (21:48); and non-U.S. central banks diversifying part of their forex reserves away from the dollar (36:20). The podcast was recorded April 25, 2022.
In addition to his economic training in academia and market experience on Wall Street, Mr. Pozsar brings deep experience from within the financial and monetary system itself. Before joining Credit Suisse in 2015, he served as a senior adviser to the U.S. Treasury Department, focusing on matters of financial innovation. As part of the response to the global financial crisis and contributions to the resulting policy debate, in August 2008 he joined the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. There he oversaw market intelligence for securitized credit markets and served as point person on market developments for senior Federal Reserve, Treasury and White House officials. He also worked at the International Monetary Fund where he took part in framing the IMF’s position on shadow banking.