Fed creates financial stability monitoring panel

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve has created a new committee headed by the central bank's No. 2 official tasked with monitoring potential threats to the nation's financial system.

The new Committee on Financial Stability will be headed by Fed Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer. Fed board of governors members Daniel Tarullo and Lael Brainard were also named to the committee.

Fed Chair Janet Yellen decided to create the new panel and picked the officials who will serve on it. It is one of seven committees and one subcommittee that the Fed will have this year to oversee the board's workload.

The panel is the Fed's latest effort to improve its monitoring of the financial system to better detect emerging problems such as the asset bubble in housing that triggered the 2008 financial crisis.