文章指出，美国联准会在2026年面临的首要风险是「独立性」。市场除了关注川普将选谁接掌Fed，更担心总统若削弱外界对Fed抑制通膨承诺的信心，后果可能很严重；即便新主席倾向降息，也必须说服FOMC并承受失败时的公信力代价。川普试图以「有理由」解职理事Lisa Cook的案件仍未落幕；若最高法院扩大总统移除Fed官员（含FOMC成员）的权力，将显著提升其左右货币政策、甚至改组委员会的能力。
利率方面，政治之外Fed也有理由按兵不动：Powell认为在去年3次各25个基点降息后，政策利率已落在「中性利率的合理估计区间」。在稳定就业与达成2%通膨目标之间的拉扯应减轻，但要累积足够证据支持再调整利率仍需时间。经济动能看似可持续，AI投资、减税与宽松金融条件形成顺风；关税的通膨效应预计到年中减退，且因豁免与重新谈判而可能小于忧虑。住房通膨也已放缓，部分原因是移民打击使家庭形成崩落。
此外还有四项：Fed约6.6兆美元资产负债表可能被要求「大幅缩表」，但这会增加利率波动与银行体系传染风险；银行监理在2023年地区银行危机后暴露流程与文化缺陷，若仅一味松绑恐让纳税人与经济承担过度风险；稳定币方面，Waller提议给金融科技有限牌照的「瘦身帐户」，可把准备金放在Fed但不付利息、无日间透支、也不能用贴现窗口，压力时更不实用；货币政策框架与沟通也待改革，例如季报SEP过度凸显单一「众数」路径而遮蔽分歧来源，Powell在2025年5月暗示可能改，但迄今未见进展。
The piece argues the Fed’s top 2026 challenge is independence. Markets will fixate on President Trump’s choice for Fed chair, but the bigger risk is losing confidence in the Fed’s inflation-fighting commitment. Even a chair who wants lower rates can’t guarantee them: FOMC buy-in is required, and failure can damage credibility. The unresolved case of Governor Lisa Cook—whom Trump seeks to fire “for cause”—matters because a Supreme Court expansion of removal power could let presidents influence policy and even stack the committee.
On rates, the Fed has reasons to hold steady regardless of politics. Chair Jerome Powell judged policy “within a range of plausible estimates of neutral” after last year’s three 25-basis-point cuts. That should reduce tension between labor-market stability and the 2% inflation goal, but evidence for further moves will take time. Growth tailwinds include AI investment, tax cuts, and very easy financial conditions. Tariff-driven inflation should fade by mid-year and may be smaller due to carve-outs and renegotiations; housing inflation has moderated amid an immigration crackdown and weaker household formation.
Four more challenges: a roughly $6.6 trillion balance sheet, where sharp shrinkage could raise rate volatility and banking contagion risk; bank supervision, after the 2023 regional-bank crisis exposed process and culture flaws, where mere deregulation could shift risk to taxpayers; stablecoins, where “skinny accounts” for limited-charter fintechs would pay no interest and offer no daylight overdrafts or discount-window access; and the policy framework, where SEP communications hide why rate-path views differ and scenario-based alternatives (as at the ECB) have been proposed, yet little has changed since Powell’s May 2025 hint.