Wednesday, March 23, 2005

China Renminbi revaluation?

I have been trying to follow what China is doing with the Renminbi and the possible impact on the US economy. Here's an interesting article by Brad Setser: The $1.3 billion question: What will happen to the renminbi which speculates that China will not only revalue the Renminbi from its current US dollar peg, but that the change will be 10% or greater:

Still, I came away thinking the odds of a major move in the renminbi -- say a revaluation of more than 10% -- are higher than I thought going in. Why? Because Chinese economists, including economists in research institutes with links to the People's Bank of China, are very aware that the-oft discussed 3-5% revaluation in the renminbi would not do much. It is too small a move to have much of an impact on China's (growing) global trade surplus. More importantly, such small move would leave investors expecting a further renminbi appreciation. Consequently, it would not significantly reduce the pace of China's reserve accumulation.

e.p.c. posted this at 13:54 GMT on 23-Mar-2005 .

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