data and Fed communication

Does the Fed have a communication problem, or do markets have a listening problem? by Neil Irwin

Hop in your time machine and set the dial for, say, this past April. Once there, call up any of the smarter people who make their living analyzing what the Federal Reserve is doing, and ask them two questions: How much bond-buying will the Fed be doing in the fall, and who will be the next chairman of the Fed? 

Their answer back in April would have been "$85 billion a month" and "Janet Yellen." Those answers now look correct. But the voyage from there to here has been a doozy.