Today, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin virtually testified before the Senate Committee on Banking providing a quarterly update on the Main Street Lending Program and the Municipal Liquidity Facility as required by the CARES Act.
*The BDA continues to be active with the Fed and all letters can be found here.
Included in his testimony, Powell indicated that the MLF will be fully operational by the end of May, and that they expect the program to “have a big impact on the markets.”
The Chairman also acknowledged a recent letter by a bi-partisian group of Senatorsurging the Fed to intervene in the secondary municipal market, but gave no indication they were preparing to do so. These follow Kent Hiteshew’s comments yesterday that the MFL is open for business and is able to accept NOI’s and applications from approved issuers.
The BDA will continue to provide updates as they become available.
Bond Dealers of America
May 19, 2020