Jackson Hole Meets a Chairman Who Has Chosen Not to Guide Markets

By EC Assets · Published 28 August 2026 · Updated 28 August 2026

Since the financial crisis, the most dependable seller of volatility in global markets was a central bank.

Kevin Warsh takes the podium at Jackson Hole this morning for his first keynote as Fed Chair. Markets want a reaction function. He has been explicit that he does not intend to supply one.

Most read that as a communication problem.

It is a pricing problem.

Forward guidance was never only information. It was a standing commitment to narrow the range of outcomes, and allocators capitalised that commitment into their position sizing without ever calling it a position.

The backdrop is not calm. The 30-year Treasury yield closed at 5.31% on 17 August, its highest since 2007, and the Treasury stepped into the bond market two days later to bring long-end costs down. Roughly a third of traders expect a rate rise in September.

Into that arrives a chairman who would rather markets signal the Fed than the reverse.

Here is what many allocators overlook: withdrawing guidance does not change the direction of policy. It widens the distribution around every scheduled date on the calendar.

That reprices optionality long before it shows up in realised moves. A CNBC survey found 45% of economists expect no guidance at all today.

When consensus says nothing will be said, nothing becomes the cheapest thing to be wrong about.

At EC Assets, we price that widening rather than forecast what causes it.

Guidance never removed the uncertainty. It only decided who was paid to carry it.