Debt-Limit Solution Needed by October

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned that the department will probably exhaust its ability to avoid breaching the federal debt limit sometime in October, sending a message to congressional leaders as she prepares to step up talks with lawmakers on boosting or suspending the ceiling.

“Based on our best and most recent information, the most likely outcome is that cash and extraordinary measures will be exhausted during the month of October,” Yellen said in a letter to Congress Wednesday. “We will continue to update Congress as more information becomes available.”

Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said separately Wednesday that there were multiple options to resolve the debt-limit question, without specifying them.

Yellen aims to ramp up her engagement with members of Congress as more lawmakers return to Washington from their summer recess, according to a Treasury official, speaking on condition of anonymity as the plans aren’t yet public.

The October deadline for action is slightly later than the earliest possible date previously indicated by the Treasury. Yellen said in July that there were scenarios in which the Treasury could exhaust its special measures and run out of cash “soon after Congress returns from recess” in September. Estimating the end point for averting a potential payments default has been more challenging this year due to hard-to-predict spending and revenue flows linked to the pandemic, the Treasury says.

Yields on 10-year U.S. Treasuries were little changed following the release of Yellen’s letter. Financial markets so far have shown limited concern about a payments default.

Democratic lawmakers have been expected to attach a measure addressing the debt limit to a stopgap spending bill that will be needed to ensure the federal government stays funded past the start of the fiscal year on October 1. But congressional leaders indicated Wednesday that other options are also on the table.

“We have a number of different ways we are looking to get the debt ceiling done,” Schumer said Wednesday in a telephone press conference. “We must get it done. Stay tuned.” Pelosi similarly said, at a separate briefing, “We’ll have several options, we’ll make them well-known to you as we narrow them.” She said of raising the debt ceiling: “It has to happen.”

Almost all Republican senators have pledged to vote against lifting or suspending the limit, tying that position to their antipathy toward Democrats’ moves to enact a $3.5 trillion package of social spending. Ten GOP senators would need to back boosting the debt ceiling for it to pass that chamber under so-called regular order.

The office of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky offered no comment on Yellen’s letter and referred to McConnell’s earlier remarks that Democrats need to come up with the votes to raise the ceiling on their own.

Democrats have highlighted that they joined with Republicans in suspending the debt limit when President Donald Trump was in office, and demanded a similar move by GOP lawmakers now.

“I again note that Congress has addressed the debt limit in recent years through regular order, with broad bi-partisan support,” Yellen said in her letter to congressional leaders Wednesday. The Treasury secretary also warned Congress against waiting until the department is on the verge of a payments default before addressing the debt ceiling.

“We have learned from past debt-limit impasses that waiting until the last minute to suspend or increase the debt limit can cause serious harm to business and consumer confidence, raise short-term borrowing costs for taxpayers, and negatively impact the credit rating” of the United States, Yellen said.

A decade ago, just getting close to a historic debt default rattled financial markets, resulting in the first-ever credit downgrade of federal debt and tanking stocks, consumer confidence, and approval ratings for both then-President Barack Obama and Congress. The federal debt limit came back into effect—at a level of $28.4 trillion—this August following a two-year suspension. Since then, the Treasury has deployed extraordinary accounting moves in order to allow the government to keep paying its bills.

—With assistance from Laura Litvan & Billy House.

Copyright 2021 Bloomberg. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.