quelli di alphaville quando vedono qualche crisi la rispolverano da tutte le parti
Currency wars – ‘The crisis is upon us’
Posted by
Izabella Kaminska on Oct 14 11:38. We’ve already
commented on the rampant descent of the dollar on Thursday.
But here’s a scarily convincing argument from Marc Ostwald at Monument Securities about what all these QE-related
currency war shenanigans could really be indicating.
In one smooth line he suggests “the cracks are getting wider, the crisis is upon us”:
The rift between Japan and Korea which has spilt into the open in the past 24 hours, with a Japan minister protesting Korea’s currency policy, only to be rebuffed by the BoK governor, is significant for the rifts that are opening up WITHIN Asia. While Japan knows that it cannot realistically compete with China, it is clearly not going to let South Korea, with whom it competes in electronics, autos, shipping and heavy industry, carry on with the by now very blatant attempt to stifle won gains not only by intervention, but by not raising rates when the case for higher rates in terms of keeping inflation under control is crystal clear (rates currently 2.25% while inflation is firmly entrenched above 3.0%). Keep watching this space, as much as US-China currency tensions.
Today’s USD slide and EUR, GBP, JPY & AUD gains serve to highlight the ever decreasing (or perhaps that should be unvirtuous) circles of FX intervention and reserve diversification, i.e. Asian central bank intervenes (buys USD), then diversifies USD, thereby putting renewed downward pressure on the USD, which in turn forces more intervention. I believe this is known both as ‘chasing your own tail’ and an ‘accident waiting to happen’.
c) Start taking more note of what is going outside of the ostensibly major players: i) Russia widens rouble intervention band – sells it as a step towards inflation targeting – but in truth they are fed up with constant non-RUB flow related interventions, and the instability of their $480 Bln FX reserves ii) Singapore tightens policy, but widens SGD intervention band for the first time since 9/11, eminently expecting more volatility and again probably fed up with intervening. iii) Taiwan regulator suggests foreign investors put up foreign currency as margin for Taiwan stock trades – are they fed up with intervening? I think so..
More observations as and when they come to light, but there seems little doubt that we are now heading down the cliff face of a full blown crisis, but smelling the coffee of that crisis is not yet en vogue!
Which means currency wars may end up bolstering the vicious circle many of the world’s most prominent economies are already in.
Interventionist moves are not going to help — please stop.
The imposing result, otherwise, could be something pretty ugly — and just in time for Christmas too.