Historical Perspective on Financial Stability
The term "financial stability" has a particular meaning in this context. A stable financial system is one that continues to function effectively even in severely adverse conditions. A stable system meets the borrowing and investment needs of households and businesses despite economic turbulence. An unstable system, in contrast, may amplify turbulence and prolong economic hardship in the face of stress by failing to provide these essential services when they are needed most.
For Economic Club of New York trivia buffs, I will note that the second ever presentation to this club by a Federal Reserve official was about this very topic. The date was March 18, 1929. Weeks before, the Fed had issued a public statement of concern over stock market speculation, and had provided guidance frowning on bank funding of such speculation. William Harding, a former Fed Chair and then president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, defended the Fed's actions in his talk. He argued that, while the Fed should not act as the arbiter of correct asset prices, it did have a primary responsibility to protect the banking system's capacity to meet the credit needs of households and businesses. At the meeting, critics argued that public statements about inflated asset prices were "fraught with danger;" that the nation's banks were so well managed that they should not "face public admonition"; and, more generally, that the Fed was "out of its sphere."1 Of course, Harding spoke just a few months before the 1929 stock market crash, which signaled the onset of the Great Depression.
www.federalreserve.g...81128a.htm