新闻周刊：美国是否在玩货币游戏？

　　

　　毫无疑问，中国人民币币值将在本周的二十国集团峰会上遭到许多批评。世界各国领导人此次会议的目的是找到解决那些生产商品的国家(中国和韩国)和购买商品的国家(美国等国家)之间贸易不平衡的方法。美国称，创造一个公平竞争条件的关键是，作为世界第二大出口大国的中国停止操纵人民币币值。

　　甚至连奥巴马总统也对中国进行了并不含蓄的批评。他在印度时对记者称：“我们不能继续保持这样的局面，一些国家仍在保持大量顺差，其它国家则面临大量赤字。对货币的调整可以导致一个更为平衡的增长模式，这种现象至今还没有出现。”

　　这种想法有一些道理。中国确实人为地保持人民币币值，从而使它的商品对于美国人和欧洲人来说更为便宜。这一政策也使美国商品对中国人来说更为昂贵。在共和党控制众议院、经济仍处于困境的情况下，奥巴马正承受着比以往更大的压力，想让中国在其操纵货币方面作出让步，但奥巴马可能发现自己并不处在可以批评中国的有利位置。

　　包括德国财长和巴西当选总统在内的一些领导人现在称，美国也在玩货币游戏。美联储已宣布将启动总额6千亿美元的第二轮定量宽松计划。美联储主席伯南克称，这一举措是为了帮助银行借贷，推动经济增长，但许多国家认为这显然是美国在制造美元贬值，从而帮助美国出口。

　　一些世界领导人称，美方举措与中国的行动很相似。德国财长朔伊布勒称：“美国人指控中国人操纵汇率，随后又印刷美元来人为压低美元汇率，这样的行为是不一致的。”

　　Is the United States Playing Games With Money？

　　Obama may not be in any position to throw stones toward China at this week’s G20.

　　No one doubts there will be lots of sparring over the value of China’s yuan at this week’s G20 conference, where a score ofprominent and developing countries are meeting in Seoul. The gathering of the world’s leaders is supposed to find a fix to the trade imbalance between countries that make things (think China and South Korea) and those that mainly buy goods, like America. The U.S. says the key to creating a more level playing field is for China, the world’s second-largest exporter, to stop manipulating the value of its currency. Some members of Congress, like New York’s Sen. Charles Schumer, are even talking about hitting China with tariffs if it doesn’t let the yuan rise。

　　Even President Barack Obama unleashed a thinly disguised dig at China. “We can’t continue to sustain a situation in which some countries are maintaining massive surpluses, others massive deficits, and there never is the kind of adjustments with respect to currency that would lead to a more balanced growth pattern,” he said to reporters in India。

　　There is something to this line of thinking. China does keep the value of the yuan artificially low so that its goods will be cheaper for Americans and Europeans. And the policy also makes American goods more expensive for the Chinese. U.S policymakers say this is one reason that the Chinese don’t buy more American products. And with the Republicans seizing the House and the economy still in the dumps, Obama is under more pressure than ever to push China on its currency manipulation。

　　But the president may find himself in no position to hurl stones。

　　Some leaders, including Germany’s finance minister and the president-elect of Brazil, are now saying that America is also playing games with money. This past Wednesday, the Federal Reserve said it would print $600 billion to buy Treasury bonds from banks over the next eight months to help stimulate the economy. That’s on top of the $1.7 trillion in new dollars already created since the start of the recession. Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke says the move is intended to help get banks lending and ignite growth, but much of the world sees it as a transparent attempt to drive down the value of the greenback and help American exports。

　　Sort of like what China does, say some world leaders. “It’s inconsistent for the Americans to accuse the Chinese of manipulating exchange rates and then to artificially depress the dollar exchange rate by printing money,” German Finance Minister Wolfgang Sch?uble, told the magazine Der Speigel. The Russians, Brazilians, and, of course, the Chinese have also called the U.S. out on what they say is hypocritical behavior. “What the U.S. is doing reads to a lot of countries as engineering a weak dollar,” says Uri Dadush, a former director of international trade at the World Bank。

　　Why would America want a weak dollar? Basically for the same reason China wants a weak yuan, says Dadush. A cheaper dollar means other countries can buy American products for less. And Obama has said he wants to double American exports in five years. “A weaker dollar may help beef up American exports, and emerging-market countries believe that is the [reason for the Fed move],” says Dadush。

　　Even just the rumors that the Fed would restart the money presses sent the dollar tumbling 15 percent against the euro in the past five months. Money managers and economists say that number could continue to increase as dollars begin to flood international markets。

　　But many economists say it’s unfair to compare the effect of the Fed’s actions with intentional currency manipulation。

　　“The comparison is outrageous,” Joseph Gagnon, a former associate director of monetary affairs at the Fed, told NEWSWEEK。

　　“The U.S. is trying to stimulate its economy, and the devaluation is an unintended side effect. China and Brazil are deliberately debasing their currency. They are waging a currency war。”

　　Bernanke has said that the purpose of the cash injection was to boost lending by banks and give the stock market an extra bump, which may help get Americans spending again. The Fed has no official policy of pushing down the value of the dollar, which, unlike the yuan, is traded on open markets around the world。

　　Whether it is intentional or not, developing countries worry that lowering the dollar will make Americans less willing to buy their imports. Nations such as China and Brazil also fear that a massive spillover of dollars into their own banks could cause housing bubbles similar to the one that started the last recession, says Eswar Prasad, a trade economist at Cornell University. With financiers searching for a place to invest the new glut of dollars, real estate in emerging markets could be a target. Leaders of these markets dread the effect an American boom-bust cycle could have on their still-fragile economies。

　　“The Fed policy may or may not help the U.S., but it has large risks for the rest of the world,” says Prasad。

　　Regardless of whether the comparisons are valid, Obama may do well to take the fears of other countries to heart before pushing too hard on the currency issue. “We need to cool it down. Right now you have politicians almost calling for a trade war,” says Jagdish Bhagwati, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “There is lots of room for cooperation, but atmospherics do matter, and we need to take a more tolerant tone。”

　　(新闻周刊)

　　(解雨)

　　

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