Central banks are incurring losses, but critics' concerns are overblown

First came the surge in inflation, which central banks did not foresee or prevent. Now as interest rates rise, many central banks around the world are reporting heavy financial losses on the financial assets they acquired over the previous decade—a further reputational blow because central banks have tended to make profits year in and year out.
The biggest hit has been to the Swiss National Bank (SNB), which lost the equivalent of $143 billion in 2022. This sum is almost 18 percent of Swiss GDP and may be the largest one-year loss ever recorded by a central bank.
Recent Central Bank Losses in…