Bernanke leaves market sentiment teetering Federal Reserve Bank Chairman Ben Bernanke. US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke has managed to frighten markets by suggesting the current quantitative easing measures that have been pushing US growth could start to taper off as soon as June. The Dow Jones index immediately headed south - a lead that was followed by the Australian market on Thursday. The US stimulus package - referred to as the 'Bernanke put' - has been the major shot of adrenalin for a sluggish US economy and the stockmarket. Second guessing when the Fed might start to apply the breaks is a national pastime for market players. But the language of Fedspeak has a particular dialect that is open to interpretation. His speech tried to balance competing objectives. It hedged its and ultimately led to confusion. He said the US economy was improving but headwinds including government spending cuts were dragging on the recovery. He said the job market was improving but it remains weak overall and participation rates are still moving down. But it was the 'tapering off' comment that sent US stock and bond markets in into a tailspin and pushed bond yields sharply higher. His comment was supported by the just-released minutes of the last Fed board meeting which said: "A number of participants expressed willingness to adjust the flow of (bond) purchases downward as early as the June meeting if the economic information received by that time showed evidence of sufficiently strong and sustained growth." Meanwhile the remarks sent the US dollar soaring and pushed our local currency off a cliff, falling as far as 96.27 US cents, its lowest since October 2011. It was a strong reaction to comments that only touched on the option of easing rather than suggested it was a forgone conclusion. Bernanke is leaving the door open to take some stimulus out of the economy - when this happens depends on the rate of recovery in the US economy. Economists responded this morning saying they were expecting the Fed would start to curb bond buying this calendar year.