College of Humanities and Social Sciences Senior Honors Thesis
The Rhetoric of the Financial Crisis: Examining 2007-2009 Federal Open Market Committee Statements
By Rob Perrone
Submitted to:
Dr. Andrea Deciu Ritivoi, Advisor Dr. Christine Neuwirth, Head, Department of English
Dr. John Lehoczky, Dean, College of Humanities and Social Sciences
Table of Contents
Introduction 3
Historical Context 6
Corpus 14
Analysis 18
Theory: Fairclough and Benoit 19
Pre 2007: Big Shoes to Fil123
March 2006 - August 2007: Adherence to Genre and a Focus on Inflation 25
August 2007: Clear Words for Big Problems 30
September 2007 - December 2007: Bemanke Finds His Voice 33
January 2008 - October 2008: Towards a Crisis Rhetoric 35
December 2008: Justifying Zero Percent Rates 37
January - December 2009: A Reconsideration of Genre and Rhetorical Goals 41
Justifying Aggressive Interventions 46
Conclusion: Bemanke's Rhetoric, Vindicated 50
Discussion 52
Bibliography 55
Glossary 59
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Introduction
In the financial world, words move markets. Of this, there can be no doubt. Some words are
spoken--on conference calls, on television, on podiums, and on trading floors. Some words are
read-in SEC filings, in stock tickers, in congressional hearings, and in the Wall Street Journal.
Some words are typed--on Blackberries, in emails, in editorials, and in blogs. Some words are
celebrated; some words are illegal. (What are bans on insider if not restrictions on the audience
for certain utterances?) Some words are rumors, and some words are official.
This paper examines words from the latter group--official statements from the Federal
Reserve. Specifically, this paper analyzes statements from Federal Open Market Committee
(FOMC) meetings during the 2007-2009 crisis. In matters of monetary policy, the FOMC is the
most powerful institution within the Fed, and its statements are among the most influential texts
in the financial world. In 2007-2009, FOMC statements were shaped by two important variables:
the aspirations of a new Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke, and the pressures of a raging liquidity
panic. Markets become sensitive to all forms of information-including language-in times of
crisis. Well-placed, well-formed words can calm investors; hasty statements can cause markets to
erupt with volatility.
Given the importance of language in the financial world, the relative lack of scholarly
interest in financial texts is surprising. To date, there is no significant body of rhetorical analysis
on texts from the financial crisis. Part ofthis is surely due to the tedium of the peer-review
process, and perhaps some articles are in review or revision. But no serious scholar in rhetoric
would question the value of analyzing political texts; why, then, has no one asserted the value of
analyzing financial texts? In financial texts-particularly those that reach Wall Street audiences
quickly-we find an amazing set of mechanisms for gauging audience reactions. We can look to
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market indexes, like the Dow Jones industrial Average, the Standard and Poor's 500, or the
NASDAQ. We can look at the stock price of an individual company, or at measures ofliquidity,
like the London interbank overnight lending rate. We can look at the secondary market for
Treasury securities. The financial world is rife with quantitative gauges of audience reactions.
This saves us from guesswork, or from speculating about how audiences might have responded
to a text. Instead, we can simply ask of any text-Who on Wall Street has a stake in this text?
When could they access it? When could they act on the information in the text? What is the best
measure of their action?
During the financial crisis, some remarkable chains of events occurred, and many of
these were caused by language. When Bear Stearns fell in March 2008, investors worried that
many of the weaknesses that destroyed Bear would also plague Lehman Brothers. Amidst this
panic, Lehman's then-CFO, Erin Callan, held a warmly received conference call with investors,
buoying Lehman's stock price. Later that year, hedge fund manager David Einhorn reinterpreted
language from that very conference call to motivate a massive short selling of Lehman stock.
Lehman Brothers went bankrupt in September 2008. Communications from the Fed are never
this hostile or aggressive, but they are no less important.
To analyze the 2007-2009 FOMC statements, this paper presents a brief historical
overview of the crisis and its causes, and some background information on how the FOMC and
its statements function. Then, using Norman Fairclough's critical language study (CLS) theory,
this paper offers a critical analysis of the FOMC statements.
Broadly, we find that 2007 statements were characterized by adherence to traditional
generic structures, and that these statements had difficulty achieving their rhetorical goals. As the
crisis unfolded, the statements show trends away from previous genre conventions and towards a
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crisis rhetoric. Concurrently, statements throughout the crisis reflect Bemanke's efforts to make
Fed communications clearer and more transparent. By 2009, statements barely resemble 2007
statements, representing a shift to a new set of generic structures. This paper argues that, if the
strategies used in 2009 statements had been adopted earlier, the FOMC might have enjoyed
greater rhetorical success, particularly in mediating Wall Street expectations about monetary
policy. Finally, this paper concludes with an attempt to motivate further rhetorical research in
financial texts.
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Historical Context
Introduction
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This overview serves as a brief summary of the crisis and its causes. Readers interested only in
historical information that directly informs the analysis should read the historical background
from 2001 onward, and refer to the glossary for any unfamiliar terms.
Broadly, several forces emerged in the 1990's and early 2000's that made mortgage-
backed investments extremely lucrative and popular. Unfortunately, most investors in mortgage
debt wrongly assumed that housing prices would continue to rise indefinitely, and when housing
prices fell, the collateral for mortgage back debt lost its value. With the collateral for many
mortgages suddenly worth less than the debt, defaults on mortgages began to affect anyone who
invested in mortgage debt. Since lending practices grew lax-in some cases, outright
predatory-during the 1990's housing boom, many borrowers could not afford their loan
payments. When these borrowers defaulted, everyone holding mortgage debt, including most
major Wall Street banks, faced huge losses. With these losses, banks lost capital, and became
reluctant to lend to each other. This behavior sparked a liquidity freeze (a "credit crunch"),
making it difficult for borrowers of any size to secure credit. To restore liquidity and stability to
the financial system, the Federal Reserve was forced to make several aggressive interventions.
Many of these interventions were politically unpopular, forcing the Fed to convincingly justify
its actions.
To unearth the root causes of the financial crisis, we must begin our inquiry by looking at
a piece of banking legislation from 1933.
1933: The Glass-Steagall Act
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Following the 1929 stock market crash, legislators searched for ways to reign in risky banks. In
the early thirties, Congress passed a number of reforms aimed at preventing deflation and
stabilizing markets. One of the most significant such reforms was the Glass-Steagall Act, also
called the Banking Act of 1933.
The Glass-Steagall Act did three things: it created the Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation (FDIC), created a legal distinction between investment and commercial banks, and
prevented bank holding companies from owning investment banks (Sorkin 173). The second and
third components work together, and the third is especially significant. Commercial banks have
depositors, who receive a modest interest rate for capital they deposit. Banks then invest using
capital from deposits.
However, commercial banks-and the bank holding companies that often control them-
are subject to moderate oversight and regulation. In return for "playing by the rules," commercial
banks receive government protection and insurance, including FDIC backing. One restriction on
commercial banks is on their leverage, or the ratio between their debt and equity. If a bank must
maintain a leverage ratio of at least 10%, this means that for every ten million dollars in debt, the
bank must hold at least one million dollars in liquid capital.
A crucial distinction between investment and commercial banks is that investment banks
are much more lightly regulated, and receive little or no government protection. Investment
banks also work differently than commercial banks. Commercial banks have depositors, and can
invest on their own behalf using deposits. Investment banks have clients, rather than depositors,
