This Chart Shows How Wall Street Banks and the Fed Have Become a Match Made in Hell

July 25, 2023

by Pam Martens and Russ Martens Wall Street on Parade

Prior to Ben Bernanke being sworn in as Fed Chair on February 6, 2006, the United States had been through World War I, the Great Depression, World War II, the Vietnam War and the stagflation of the 1970s, without an explosion in the Fed’s balance sheet. But since Ben Bernanke, Janet Yellen and Jerome Powell have, in turn, sat at the helm of the Federal Reserve, there has been unprecedented growth in the Fed’s Balance Sheet.

For example, from June 1960 to August 1990, the Fed’s balance sheet increased from $53 billion to $309 billion – an increase of 483 percent in 30 years. But during the tenures of Bernanke, Yellen and Powell, the Fed’s balance sheet has exploded from $805 billion in February 2006, when Bernanke took his seat as Fed Chair, to the current reading last Wednesday, July 19, 2023, of $8.3 trillion. That’s an increase of 931 percent in just a little over 17 years. The trajectory on the chart above says it all.