Putting it all together, my reading of the evidence is that we are seeing a fairly significant pattern of reaching-for-yield behavior emerging in corporate credit. However, even if this conjecture is correct, and even if it does not bode well for the expected returns to junk bond and leveraged-loan investors, it need not follow that this risk-taking has ominous systemic implications.
If the central bank was held accountable for failing to achieve one objective, it could always defend itself by saying that its efforts were directed at one or more of the other objectives which it viewed as more important at the time.