Legislation offered by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the “Federal Reserve Transparency Act of 2024,” would conduct an audit of the U.S. Federal Reserve by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) for the first time since the Dodd-Frank legislation of 2010 required an audit of the central bank’s purchases of mortgage-backed securities.
This time around, the GAO would look at the Fed’s entire balance sheet, including the recently enacted Bank Term Funding Program — now $141 billion according to the central bank’s latest H.4.1. release — that has been lending banks money in exchange for U.S. Treasuries after the spike in interest rates caused there to be a reported $620 billion of unreported losses including regional banks that experienced failures in the interest rate crunch.
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