The Federal Reserve shocked global investors last week when it announced it will start spending $40 billion a month to buy bonds in order to prop up the U.S. economy. St. Louis Fed President James Bullard is a non-voting member this time around and in a sit-down interview he says he would not have voted for the asset purchases based on timing. SOUNDBITE: ST. LOUIS FEDERAL RESERVE PRESIDENT JAMES BULLARD (ENGLISH) SAYING: "You do have the global slowdown going on and that is concerning to me, and I think concerning to everybody, and so far it hasn't really impinged heavily on the United States but it is possible that that could be...bite more in the future here, but we have to see. I just would've wanted to wait to see a little more about how that is going to develop." Specifically Bullard thinks the Fed should've had waited to see what Europe does this fall to stop the three-year-old debt crisis and the negative impact on the global economy. SOUNDBITE: ST. LOUIS FEDERAL RESERVE PRESIDENT JAMES BULLARD (ENGLISH) SAYING: "Europe, I have said before, in my view doesn't seem to have the kinds of institutions, the Pan-European institutions that are needed to resolve this crisis effectively. So a lot has been put on the ECB but there are limits, I think, to what the ECB can do. I think this sort of conditionality in exchange for bond purchases is a dangerous precedent for central banks around the world. I would definitely not want to see the U.S. go in that direction. Now, having said all that, I do think that they're in a difficult situation and they have to try to do what they can. But I would prefer the ECB take actions that can be understood and justified as monetary policy actions that are for the benefit of the European economy as a whole and not for specific segments or specific places within Europe." And what about the Federal Reserve, how should it determine its next move, given its focus on getting the unemployment rate down? SOUNDBITE: ST. LOUIS FEDERAL RESERVE PRESIDENT JAMES BULLARD (ENGLISH) SAYING: "Because you've got so much going on with labor force participation - I'm not sure you just want to look at unemployment as a metric. You want to look at the entire labor market picture and really more broadly the entire macro-economic picture. You'd like to look at growth, consumption, because probably labor markets will lag behind strength in the economy." Bullard's comments reflect tensions around the table - with other Fed officials standing by the Fed's latest attempts to pump up the economy. Conway Gittens, Reuters