By Nick Timiraos 

JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. -- For the central bankers gathered in the Grand Tetons, a meaty discussion of exchange rates and monetary policy spillovers will take precedence over fly fishing and mountain hiking.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City's annual economic retreat began Thursday evening and runs through Saturday at its traditional venue, the Jackson Lake Lodge, selected decades ago for its appeal to former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker, a fly-fishing enthusiast.

Attendance is by invitation only. Here is a cheat sheet on what to expect over the next few days:

On the Agenda

The theme of this year's conference is "Challenges for Monetary Policy." Kansas City Fed President Esther George will host an opening reception Thursday evening.

The conference gets under way Friday morning. At 10 a.m. EDT Friday, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell will deliver a speech with the same title as the conference theme.

After he speaks, three research papers will be presented and discussed. Bank of England Gov. Mark Carney delivers the lunchtime keynote address.

On Saturday, two more research papers will be presented and discussed. A concluding panel will feature Gita Gopinath , chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, with two central bankers -- Philip Lowe , governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia, and Amir Yaron , governor of the Bank of Israel.

In Attendance

This year's conference features another star-studded attendance list, at least for the world of central banking.

-- In addition to Mr. Powell, all four other Fed governors are coming. Eleven of the Fed's reserve bank presidents are also on the list. (San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly is absent.)

-- The participants, as usual, include a strong contingent of foreign central bankers. Among them are three European Central Bank officials, Benoît Coeuré , Philip Lane and Sabine Lautenschläger; Bank for International Settlements General Manager Agustín Carstens ; Bank of Canada Gov. Stephen Poloz; South African Reserve Bank Gov. Lesetja Kganyago; Hong Kong Monetary Authority Chief Executive Norman Chan ; Bank of Mexico Gov. Alejandro Díaz de León; Sveriges Riksbank Gov. Stefan Ingves; Bank of Finland Gov. Olli Rehn; Bank of Japan Deputy Gov. Masazumi Wakatabe; Reserve Bank of Peru Gov. Julio Velarde; Norges Bank Gov. Øystein Olsen; De Nederlandsche Bank President Klaas Knot ; Reserve Bank of New Zealand Gov. Adrian Orr; Danmarks Nationalbank Governor Lars Rohde ; Bank of Latvia Gov. Ilm rs Rimšēvičs; Central Bank of Argentina Gov. Guido Sandleris ; Czech National Bank Gov. Jiří Rusnok; National Bank of Belgium Gov. Pierre Wunsch.

-- There are no attendees from the Trump administration for the second straight year, but St. Louis Fed research director Christopher Waller , whom President Trump has announced as a forthcoming nominee to the Fed's board, is attending.

-- A couple of industry economists are in attendance, including Constance Hunter , president of the National Association of Business Economists, and Diane Swonk , chief economist at Grant Thornton.

-- Several former Fed officials also are set to join, including former Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen . Other former Fed officials include Alan Blinder and Roger Ferguson , who both served as vice chairman, and former Kansas City Fed President Thomas Hoenig.

-- The list also includes a couple of former and current government officials, including Phillip Swagel , director of the Congressional Budget Office, and Jason Furman , former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under former President Obama.

-- And of course, the conference is full of academics, including Annette Vissing-Jørgensen, Maurice Obstfeld , Yuriy Gorodnichenko and Barry Eichengreen of the University of California, Berkeley; Deborah Lucas , Kristin Forbes and Athanasios Orphanides of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Janice Eberly of Northwestern University; Gauti Eggertsson of Brown University; John Taylor , Martin Schneider , Monika Piazzesi and Arvind Krishnamurthy of Stanford University; John Leahy of the University of Michigan; Eswar Prasad of Cornell University; Carmen Reinhart of Harvard University; Valerie Ramey of the University of California, San Diego; Amir Sufi and Chad Syverson of the University of Chicago; Alan Taylor of the University of California, Davis; and Johnathan Wright of Johns Hopkins University.

Write to Nick Timiraos at nick.timiraos@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 22, 2019 20:14 ET (00:14 GMT)

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