The Fed and its fellow regulators put together a public-private committee on Libor replacement big enough to swamp a ferry boat. The use of Libor as a base rate for funding costs is bigger than ever — around $225tn of derivatives, consumer loans, corporate loans and cash investments. The process of finding practical ways to replace it have led to increasingly audible shouting and blame trading between the major dealing banks and the Fed, along with the central bank’s entourage of agencies, academics, policy wonks and whisperers.
