Friday, January 23, 2009

Stop the "presses"?

Shock, horror, alert The Hague:

Timothy F. Geithner, who took a big step toward confirmation as Treasury secretary on Thursday, told senators that the Obama administration believes China is "manipulating" its currency, suggesting a more confrontational trade stance toward that country than under the Bush administration.
The article then goes on to detail nothing in terms of background on the issue or how this "manipulation" may or may not be happening. Putting aside the factless article and the sheer hubris of any western government at this time lecturing the Chinese (or any country) on currency and/or economic manipulation, there is a silver-lining to be found:

Mr. Geithner’s comment, made in writing to the Senate Finance Committee hours before it voted 18 to 5 to recommend that the full Senate confirm him, is certain to anger the Chinese government and raise fears that it could sell off some of its huge reserves of dollars.
Could this not help the US Treasury and US Federal Reserve in terms of "providing liquidity into the system"? Outside of that, just think of all the electricity, labor, material, and printing costs the Chinese would be helping to offset should they decide to help the west with a little ad hoc "quantitative easing".

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