Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said the central bank may decide to hold bonds on its $3.1 trillion balance sheet to maturity as part of a review of its strategy for an exit from record monetary easing. Bernanke told lawmakers in Washington today that he expects to revisit “sometime soon” an exit plan that policy makers outlined in June 2011. Under that plan, the Fed would cease reinvesting some or all principal payments from its securities, revise its interest- rate outlook, raise the federal funds rate and then start selling housing debt to eliminate it from the central bank’s portfolio in three to five ... (full story)