US Dollar Mixed
The U.S. dollar today was mixed and without much movement, as relatively little news of significance emerged to effect the greenback.
Other currencies were similar, other than the British pound which continues to be hammered by the numerous events and pressures it's undergoing.
Neither currency is particularly appetizing at this time, neither will the be over the long term.
The U.S. dollar seems to have a chance to strengthen based on perhaps nothing else than contrarian investing, as most people have been dollar bears for a long time, and little positive is leaking out about the currency.
US Dollar Mixed
Showing posts with label Dollar Confidence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dollar Confidence. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
China's Risk with Dollar
China buying U.S. debt dollars Treasurys
Over the short term China will continue to buy up U.S. dollars in order to keep their export business thriving, but over the long term they're definitely taking steps to ensure they're not forced to be put into this position again.
China’s foreign-exchange reserves are growing again, aiding the Obama administration to sell extraordinary amounts of debt as it seeks to pull the world’s largest economy out of a recession.
Stockpiles of currency rose by a record $178 billion in the second quarter to top $2 trillion for the first time, the People’s Bank of China said recently. The numbers are close to two-thirds the size of China’s economy.
The cash holdings are increasing as the central bank sells its currency, the yuan, to try to stop an appreciation that would make the country’s exports more expensive. The yuan sales mean for all the calls by China and other emerging markets for an alternative to the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, it has little choice but to keep buying U.S. government assets.
“People are talking about whether the Chinese may actually one day dump the dollar and Treasuries because of the problem in the U.S., but they are missing the point,” said Stephen Jen, head of macroeconomics and currencies in London at BlueGold Capital LLP. “The reserves are so big because China needs to keep the exchange rate stable for its exports. Therefore, they have to keep buying dollar assets.”
To me, Jen misses the point. Just because over the short term the Chinese are buying U.S. dollar debt doesn't in any way deter the idea that they will have a policy of getting rid of the dollar over the long haul. As the dollar continues to plunge in value and inflation really takes hold, then we'll see what the Chinese will really do.
The need to balance gains in its currency led China, the largest global holder of U.S. Treasuries, to more than double its holdings of U.S. government notes and bonds in three years to $763.5 billion in April, according to U.S. Treasury data. The amount was equal to 38 percent of its reserves at the time.
Stimulus Spending
Barack Obama’s administration is trying to sell a record amount of debt to pay for measures to revive the U.S. economy. New York-based Goldman Sachs Group Inc. projects that government borrowing go as high as $3.25 trillion in the year ending Sept. 30, almost four times the $892 billion in 2008, to finance the budget deficit.
The reluctance to let the yuan appreciate when the world is mired in the deepest recession in six decades means that China will keep accumulating U.S. debt, even if the amount of its purchases declines, according to economists at RGE Monitor, a New York-based research firm headed by economist Nouriel Roubini.
“Despite China’s concerns about the value of its large stock of U.S. assets, reserve diversification will continue to be difficult."
Cash Surge
China’s reserves have grown by almost 14 times over the last 10 years as exports generated a trade surplus that pumped in cash. Capital Economics Ltd. estimates that exports will generate 30 percent of China’s growth this year.
Investors have also recently pushed cash into emerging markets such as China, amid signs that their economies will recover more quickly than those of developed nations.
Such investment inflows mean that “policy makers bought dollars and sold local currency in order to prevent currency appreciation. China will continue intervening to keep the yuan trading at about 6.83 per dollar through the end of this year.
Yuan’s Stability
The yuan’s value has barely changed in the past year, following a 21 percent appreciation in the three years after China scrapped its dollar peg in July 2005. The demand for dollars conflicts with China’s recent calls for the world to consider drawing away from the greenback as its sole reserve currency.
“As the Chinese were becoming more vocal in regard to the need to move away from the U.S. dollar, they were in actual fact buying more dollars than ever,” said Derek Halpenny, European head of global currency research at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd.
People’s Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan urged the International Monetary Fund in March to move toward creating a “super-sovereign reserve currency” to eventually replace the dollar. Premier Wen Jiabao said the same month that he was “worried” the dollar would weaken.
Speaking to Al-Arabiya television yesterday, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner expressed confidence that the dollar “will remain the principal reserve currency.”
Dollar Dominance
The dollar’s share of global foreign-exchange reserves increased to 65 percent in the first three months of this year, the most since 2007, according to the International Monetary Fund.
China is trying to reduce its reliance on the U.S. currency in other ways. It signed 650 billion yuan ($95 billion) of currency swaps this year with nations from Argentina to Belarus and is encouraging trading partners to use the yuan to settle cross-border trade.
The country’s top currency regulator this week relaxed curbs on overseas investment by local businesses, allowing more funds to flow abroad starting Aug. 1.
The 21.4 percent drop in net exports in June from a year earlier means “the yuan is stuck in cement until the middle of next year at least."
“The reserves will continue to pile up,” said Zhu Baoliang, chief economist of China’s State Information Center, an affiliate of the National Development and Reform Commission, the nation’s top economic planning agency. “Over the short term, there is not much that China can do but continue to buy U.S. Treasuries while hoping that the U.S. economy can recover as soon as possible so that China’s investment won’t suffer too much loss.”
However you want to communicate this, China over the long term will continue to diversify and not allow its currency and postion to be so dependent on the U.S. dollar. For now they'll continue to buy, but already they're taking steps to eliminate the inherent risks and very real threat of owning U.S. dollars.
China buying U.S. debt dollars Treasury's
Over the short term China will continue to buy up U.S. dollars in order to keep their export business thriving, but over the long term they're definitely taking steps to ensure they're not forced to be put into this position again.
China’s foreign-exchange reserves are growing again, aiding the Obama administration to sell extraordinary amounts of debt as it seeks to pull the world’s largest economy out of a recession.
Stockpiles of currency rose by a record $178 billion in the second quarter to top $2 trillion for the first time, the People’s Bank of China said recently. The numbers are close to two-thirds the size of China’s economy.
The cash holdings are increasing as the central bank sells its currency, the yuan, to try to stop an appreciation that would make the country’s exports more expensive. The yuan sales mean for all the calls by China and other emerging markets for an alternative to the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, it has little choice but to keep buying U.S. government assets.
“People are talking about whether the Chinese may actually one day dump the dollar and Treasuries because of the problem in the U.S., but they are missing the point,” said Stephen Jen, head of macroeconomics and currencies in London at BlueGold Capital LLP. “The reserves are so big because China needs to keep the exchange rate stable for its exports. Therefore, they have to keep buying dollar assets.”
To me, Jen misses the point. Just because over the short term the Chinese are buying U.S. dollar debt doesn't in any way deter the idea that they will have a policy of getting rid of the dollar over the long haul. As the dollar continues to plunge in value and inflation really takes hold, then we'll see what the Chinese will really do.
The need to balance gains in its currency led China, the largest global holder of U.S. Treasuries, to more than double its holdings of U.S. government notes and bonds in three years to $763.5 billion in April, according to U.S. Treasury data. The amount was equal to 38 percent of its reserves at the time.
Stimulus Spending
Barack Obama’s administration is trying to sell a record amount of debt to pay for measures to revive the U.S. economy. New York-based Goldman Sachs Group Inc. projects that government borrowing go as high as $3.25 trillion in the year ending Sept. 30, almost four times the $892 billion in 2008, to finance the budget deficit.
The reluctance to let the yuan appreciate when the world is mired in the deepest recession in six decades means that China will keep accumulating U.S. debt, even if the amount of its purchases declines, according to economists at RGE Monitor, a New York-based research firm headed by economist Nouriel Roubini.
“Despite China’s concerns about the value of its large stock of U.S. assets, reserve diversification will continue to be difficult."
Cash Surge
China’s reserves have grown by almost 14 times over the last 10 years as exports generated a trade surplus that pumped in cash. Capital Economics Ltd. estimates that exports will generate 30 percent of China’s growth this year.
Investors have also recently pushed cash into emerging markets such as China, amid signs that their economies will recover more quickly than those of developed nations.
Such investment inflows mean that “policy makers bought dollars and sold local currency in order to prevent currency appreciation. China will continue intervening to keep the yuan trading at about 6.83 per dollar through the end of this year.
Yuan’s Stability
The yuan’s value has barely changed in the past year, following a 21 percent appreciation in the three years after China scrapped its dollar peg in July 2005. The demand for dollars conflicts with China’s recent calls for the world to consider drawing away from the greenback as its sole reserve currency.
“As the Chinese were becoming more vocal in regard to the need to move away from the U.S. dollar, they were in actual fact buying more dollars than ever,” said Derek Halpenny, European head of global currency research at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd.
People’s Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan urged the International Monetary Fund in March to move toward creating a “super-sovereign reserve currency” to eventually replace the dollar. Premier Wen Jiabao said the same month that he was “worried” the dollar would weaken.
Speaking to Al-Arabiya television yesterday, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner expressed confidence that the dollar “will remain the principal reserve currency.”
Dollar Dominance
The dollar’s share of global foreign-exchange reserves increased to 65 percent in the first three months of this year, the most since 2007, according to the International Monetary Fund.
China is trying to reduce its reliance on the U.S. currency in other ways. It signed 650 billion yuan ($95 billion) of currency swaps this year with nations from Argentina to Belarus and is encouraging trading partners to use the yuan to settle cross-border trade.
The country’s top currency regulator this week relaxed curbs on overseas investment by local businesses, allowing more funds to flow abroad starting Aug. 1.
The 21.4 percent drop in net exports in June from a year earlier means “the yuan is stuck in cement until the middle of next year at least."
“The reserves will continue to pile up,” said Zhu Baoliang, chief economist of China’s State Information Center, an affiliate of the National Development and Reform Commission, the nation’s top economic planning agency. “Over the short term, there is not much that China can do but continue to buy U.S. Treasuries while hoping that the U.S. economy can recover as soon as possible so that China’s investment won’t suffer too much loss.”
However you want to communicate this, China over the long term will continue to diversify and not allow its currency and postion to be so dependent on the U.S. dollar. For now they'll continue to buy, but already they're taking steps to eliminate the inherent risks and very real threat of owning U.S. dollars.
China buying U.S. debt dollars Treasury's
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
U.S. Dollar in First Quarterly Loss since 2008
... U.S. dollar drops against Euro for quarter
The dollar rose versus the euro on Tuesday amid renewed risk aversion after a report showed an unexpected drop in U.S. consumer confidence in June.
The weak confidence report sent U.S. stocks lower and put a halt to an early sell-off in the greenback. Analysts also said the simultaneous end to the month, quarter and half-year led to increased volatility in foreign exchange trading, exacerbating intraday moves in currencies.
The decline in consumer confidence "was a big shocker," said Kathy Lien, a director for currency research at GFT Forex in New York. "The weaker confidence number should help the dollar recovery for the rest of the day."
The Conference Board's U.S. consumer confidence index fell in June to 49.3 from a downwardly revised 54.8 in May, the private business research group reported on Tuesday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast a reading of 55.0.
The confidence index followed a report showing a smaller-than-expected dip in U.S. home prices in April and a report on business activity in the U.S. Midwest.
In midday trading in New York, the euro was last down 0.4 percent at $1.4010 after trading as high as $1.4152 earlier, according to Reuters data.
Despite Tuesday's gains versus the euro, the dollar was still on track for its first quarterly decline against the single currency since the first quarter of 2008.
At the same time, an index measuring the value of the greenback against a basket of major currencies declined about 6 percent for the quarter, its first quarterly drop since the first three months of 2008. The index was last up 0.5 percent at 80.235.
"The greenback has clearly become oversold," said Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist at The Bank of New York Mellon, in New York. "It appears that the consumer confidence report provided players with an opportunity to take profit on short dollar-positions."
UPBEAT VIEWS
Investors have sold U.S. dollars recently as stock markets and oil prices rose on an upbeat view for prospects of a global economic recovery and hurt demand for the greenback as a safe haven.
The MSCI global stocks index was on course for its best quarter since its launch in 1988, up 20.9 percent at current prices, while oil earlier hit an eight-month high of $73.38 a barrel.
"The second quarter was great for stocks and there have been signs things are getting better in the financial system," said Meg Browne, a currency strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman in New York. "Altogether, this is encouraging news and the reaction to the positive outlook in the markets has been to sell the dollar and buy foreign currencies."
Some currencies, such as the Australian dollar, soared during the second quarter. The Australian dollar gained 16.5 percent versus the U.S. dollar in the past three months, its best quarterly performance since it became freely floated in 1983. The Australian dollar was last down 0.1 percent at $0.8058.
The expectation of global economic improvement gained support from the CBOE Volatility Index, Wall Street's so-called fear gauge, which dipped to its lowest level since just before Lehman Brothers collapsed last September.
"The move back in the Vix levels pre-Lehman is a result, a by-product of the overall improvement in outlook," Browne said
The dollar rose versus the euro on Tuesday amid renewed risk aversion after a report showed an unexpected drop in U.S. consumer confidence in June.
The weak confidence report sent U.S. stocks lower and put a halt to an early sell-off in the greenback. Analysts also said the simultaneous end to the month, quarter and half-year led to increased volatility in foreign exchange trading, exacerbating intraday moves in currencies.
The decline in consumer confidence "was a big shocker," said Kathy Lien, a director for currency research at GFT Forex in New York. "The weaker confidence number should help the dollar recovery for the rest of the day."
The Conference Board's U.S. consumer confidence index fell in June to 49.3 from a downwardly revised 54.8 in May, the private business research group reported on Tuesday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast a reading of 55.0.
The confidence index followed a report showing a smaller-than-expected dip in U.S. home prices in April and a report on business activity in the U.S. Midwest.
In midday trading in New York, the euro was last down 0.4 percent at $1.4010 after trading as high as $1.4152 earlier, according to Reuters data.
Despite Tuesday's gains versus the euro, the dollar was still on track for its first quarterly decline against the single currency since the first quarter of 2008.
At the same time, an index measuring the value of the greenback against a basket of major currencies declined about 6 percent for the quarter, its first quarterly drop since the first three months of 2008. The index was last up 0.5 percent at 80.235.
"The greenback has clearly become oversold," said Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist at The Bank of New York Mellon, in New York. "It appears that the consumer confidence report provided players with an opportunity to take profit on short dollar-positions."
UPBEAT VIEWS
Investors have sold U.S. dollars recently as stock markets and oil prices rose on an upbeat view for prospects of a global economic recovery and hurt demand for the greenback as a safe haven.
The MSCI global stocks index was on course for its best quarter since its launch in 1988, up 20.9 percent at current prices, while oil earlier hit an eight-month high of $73.38 a barrel.
"The second quarter was great for stocks and there have been signs things are getting better in the financial system," said Meg Browne, a currency strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman in New York. "Altogether, this is encouraging news and the reaction to the positive outlook in the markets has been to sell the dollar and buy foreign currencies."
Some currencies, such as the Australian dollar, soared during the second quarter. The Australian dollar gained 16.5 percent versus the U.S. dollar in the past three months, its best quarterly performance since it became freely floated in 1983. The Australian dollar was last down 0.1 percent at $0.8058.
The expectation of global economic improvement gained support from the CBOE Volatility Index, Wall Street's so-called fear gauge, which dipped to its lowest level since just before Lehman Brothers collapsed last September.
"The move back in the Vix levels pre-Lehman is a result, a by-product of the overall improvement in outlook," Browne said
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Loss Of Confidence in U.S. Dollar Will Generate Huge Crisis
Ron Paul talking about the challenges we'll face when confidence in the U.S. dollar becomes a larger issue. The crisis at that time will be "huge" says Paul
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