Rapidly growing Asian countries could lift living standards by allowing their currencies to appreciate and by importing more from laggards in the developed world, a top Australian central banker said on Friday.
SATURDAY, MARCH 27, 2010
Asia Could Benefit from Currency Appreciation’
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Asia could benefit from currency appreciation’
* Reserve Bank Australia's governor warns heavily indebted countries to set out credible paths to fiscal sustainability or risk market-driven rise in borrowing costs
SYDNEY: Rapidly growing Asian countries could lift living standards by allowing their currencies to appreciate and by importing more from laggards in the developed world, a top Australian central banker said on Friday.
Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) Governor Glenn Stevens also warned that heavily indebted countries in Europe and North America needed to set out credible paths to fiscal sustainability or risk a market-driven rise in borrowing costs. Stevens’ main argument was that currency appreciation would benefit fast-growing countries in Asia since it would make imports cheaper and boost living standards.
That is a different take from the United States, which has argued that Chinese control of the yuan is destroying jobs in the US and causing dangerous imbalances in world finances. Beijing’s controls on the yuan has been a major cause of friction between the US and China and a bipartisan group of Senators has proposed legislation that could lead to tariffs on Chinese exports if Beijing does not revalue its currency.
Policymakers in Australia have not joined the chorus of criticism against the yuan policy, in part because China is Australia’s biggest export market and Australia is one of the few countries that runs a trade surplus with China.
Stevens noted emerging countries from China to India, Brazil and a number of smaller east Asian countries had all enjoyed rapid recoveries from the global financial crisis.
That was leading to relatively higher interest rates than the rest of the world, attracting inflows of capital.
It also meant they would near full employment, and thus their limit of productive capacity, well before the “old world” of North America and Europe.
The emerging nations could still meet extra demand through imports from the old world, gaining a boost to living standards, but this would best involve a rise in their currencies.
Stevens said there were understandable reasons why capital inflows were distrusted by many Asian countries after the turmoil of the Asian crisis of the late 1990’s, where an exodus of hot money led to huge falls in currencies and IMF rescue packages.
“The point is, nonetheless, that the current and prospective differences in economic circumstances between significant parts of the world are likely to put strains on the relative settings of macroeconomic policies and exchange rate arrangements,” Stevens said.
On sovereign debt troubles in Europe and North America, Stevens said the global financial crisis had exacerbated fiscal problems that were already present. Aging populations and generous welfare, health and retirement systems had all played a part in worsening the fiscal outlook.
“The demographic drivers will continue for the foreseeable future, while the unwillingness or inability to tackle the structural trends in earlier “good times” has significantly reduced future flexibility,” said Stevens.
Countries obviously wanted to have their recoveries entrenched before embarking on a major fiscal tightening.
“But unless a credible path to fiscal sustainability can also be set out, growth could easily be stunted byrising risk premia built into interest rates as markets worry about long-run solvency,” Stevens warned.
AP
