ESL General English Grammar Questions

Re: ambiguous word

Mr Wordy — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 11:54:48 GMT

Englishsz
Thank you for your help, Wordy.
Does 'symmetrical' or 'asymmetrical' refer to different attitudes of Fed meeting members on rates change ?

As I understand it, it refers to the collective opinion, which will be some sort of consensus/compromise/majority arrived at by the individual members.

Re: ambiguous word

Englishsz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 08:41:40 GMT

Re: ambiguous word

Englishsz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 02:20:54 GMT

Thank you for your help, Wordy.
Does 'symmetrical' or 'asymmetrical' refer to different attitudes of Fed meeting members on rates change ?

Re: ambiguous word

Mr Wordy — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 01:37:16 GMT

As I understand it, the words are referring to the relative likelihood of the Fed putting interest rates up or down.

"Symmetrical" = rates just as likely to go up as down. In other words, "no predisposition either way".

"Asymmetrical" = a bias in the stated direction; rates more likely to go up than down, or vice versa.

ambiguous word

Englishsz — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 00:14:43 GMT

His really big worry was whether the Fed should tell the world that its bias regarding future rate hikes was "symmetrical"or "asymmetrical ".

Their deliberations show just how much faith they put in their own jawboning as they haggled endlessly over the two choices.In the end symmetry won, meaning that the Fed had no predisposition either way regarding its likely course of action .

How to understand 'symmetrical', ' asymmetrical', 'symmetry', and 'either way' in the red text?

Many thank!