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Rarely are currency exchange rates as good for the American dollar as that of Asian countries. In Asia, the American dollar carries a lot of clout and with the recent devaluation of the USD; it is a good thing that these countries offer an excellent trip for so little cost to Americans.

Rarely are currency exchange rates as good for the American dollar as that of Asian countries. In Asia, the American dollar carries a lot of clout and with the recent devaluation of the USD; it is a good thing that these countries offer an excellent trip for so little cost to Americans.

China's yuan could depreciate sharply if the government were to remove capital controls and the managed exchange rate, resulting in quite the opposite effect to what U. S. lawmakers have advocated, an economist said yesterday. Charles Dumas, a director at Lombard Street Research in London said China's capital flows have turned negative as a result of a collapse in its foreign trade in autumn and a removal of capital controls amid current economic conditions would exacerbate the situation by encouraging a large outflow of money from the country. He said this would devalue the Chinese yuan, which is also known...

The week that risk became reality Published: August 15 2008 19:31 | Last updated: August 15 2008 19:31 Trouble has been in prospect ever since the credit squeeze began last summer, but this was the week when both shoes dropped at once, everywhere from the UK to Japan and most points between. For decades, a concerted world slowdown would have only one cause: a US recession. That is no longer entirely true. To paraphrase Tolstoy, each unhappy economy is unhappy in its own way. Japan has begun to contract, and plummeting exports are not the sole culprit: domestic demand is...

I am turning to the educated community of FREE REPUBLIC for an education in the falling dollar. Please list here some forums, blogs, somewhere to get an education to make some sense out of the dollar's devaluation. Nothing I've read so far explains how this is anything but a catastrophy.

The Fed is delaying the day of reckoning By Charles Wyplosz Published: March 12 2008 16:39 | Last updated: March 12 2008 16:39 In 1971, with the greenback weak and falling, US Treasury secretary John Connally famously told the rest of the world that the US dollar was “our currency and your problem”. Thirty years later, with the dollar strong and still rising, Robert Rubin, his successor, no less famously stated that “a strong dollar is in the interest of the United States”. These days, because the dollar is weak and falling, we would have expected US officials to return...

Danes have always loved the US as a travel destination. But with the dollar at its lowest point in 30 years, residents are now gobbling up the many discount offers being pitched by the nation's travel companies. Several travel bureaus are reporting increases of up to 140 percent on sales of trips to the states, where Danes can feel like wealthy plantation barons. In the past two years, the dollar has fallen from a value of 6.4 kroner to a shocking 4.8 kroner today - its lowest point since 1977. Weekend trips to New York City have been a hot...

Only about two months ago, Canada hit parity with the U.S. dollar for the first time in 31 years. Now many Canadians have had their fill: Companies ranging from jetmaker Bombardier Inc. to lumber producer Canfor Corp. say their currency’s strength is cutting into profits and jobs. “There is not much pride in declining business,” said Ken Lewenza, a Canadian Auto Workers union leader in Windsor, Ontario, where parts suppliers are closing operations and the casino just cut another 200 jobs. “The squeeze is on, and our lives are miserable.”

The weak dollar is threatening the survival of European planemaker Airbus, chief executive Tom Enders told workers in Hamburg on Thursday. And the firm once again warned that its cost saving plan would have to cut deeper to counter the impact of the weakening US currency. Airbus is owned by European aerospace and defence group EADS. "The dollar's rapid decline is life-threatening for Airbus," Mr Enders said in the speech to employees.

A strong currency reflects booming commodity exports and sound public finances. But not everyone is cheering. IT HARDLY came as a surprise when, on September 21st, the Canadian dollar crossed a symbolic threshold and overtook its American counterpart in value for the first time since 1976. Since January 2002, when Canadians needed C$1.61 to buy a greenback, the loonie (so nicknamed after the aquatic bird depicted on the dollar coin) has been pushed up by world demand for Canada's commodities. Yet even hard-bitten currency traders cheered out loud as the loonie inched towards parity, and then beyond. David Watt, a...

The last time the Canadian dollar stood at par with the American dollar, in January, 1976, British Airways and Air France were readying the Concorde's first supersonic commercial flight and Nick Izzo was a peppy 10-year-old with an obsession for toy cars. Now the Concorde is dead and he's dealing the real thing -- saving many Canadians a lot of money as the loonie claws its way back to its former glory. Mr. Izzo and his family run Superior Auto Sales Inc., a car dealership near Lake Erie just south of Buffalo. In business for more than 50 years, they...

NEW YORK (AP) -- The dollar fell Thursday to its lowest level against the British pound in 14 years and lost value against the euro and Japanese yen. The dollar's decline came on mixed economic news from Washington and positive developments in Germany, Europe's largest economy. The Commerce Department said consumer spending increased in October after two lackluster months, but the nation's retailers reported mixed results in November. The Labor Department also reported that the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits posted an unexpectedly large increase last week, rising by 34,000 to 357,000. Meanwhile, Germany said that...

All Headline News reported that Japanese exporters are trying to take advantage of the rise in the Yen rate. When the dollar spikes, they try to sell it in order to save up for later purchases in the year. The current yen rate hovers around 114 yen = $1. I remember when it was 260 yen = $1. Some of my missionary friends tell me of a time when it was 350 = $1. When Japan started to produce quality products for very affordable prices, everyone started crying 'foul' and 'undervalued,' and then trade imbalances started growing. In the end,...

It is true that the riots in France were not the only reason behind the decline of the euro It is quite natural that 13 days of nighttime unrest on the streets of Parisian suburbs had an overall negative impact on the economic situation in France. The riots impacted the EU financial system since the France is one of the "driving belts" of the EU. The events triggered the so called negative investment and virtually toppled the exchange rate of the single European currency. Yesterday the euro fell to all-time low at the Moscow Interbank Currency Exchange: European currencyit became...

Congress shall make no law respecting wages, prices, rents, interest rates, exchange rates or any other exchange rate.

China launches currency shake-up China has revalued its currency, the yuan, for the first time in a decade - a move welcomed by the US, a long-time critic of its exchange-rate policy. The reform is being seen as the first step towards the liberalisation of China's tightly controlled currency. The yuan will no longer be pegged to the dollar, but will float against a basket of currencies. It will also appreciate against the dollar, mollifying critics who say a cheap yuan has helped Chinese exports. "I welcome China's announcement today that it is adopting a more flexible exchange rate regime,"...

With a view to establish and improve the socialist market economic system in China, enable the market to fully play its role in resource allocation as well as to put in place and further strengthen the managed floating exchange rate regime based on market supply and demand, the People's Bank of China, with authorization of the State Council, is hereby making the following announcements regarding reforming the RMB exchange rate regime: 1. Starting from July 21, 2005, China will reform the exchange rate regime by moving into a managed floating exchange rate regime based on market supply and demand with...

Some optimistic China watchers have speculated that Hu's approach to Taiwan might be more accommodating than the hawkish approach that was espoused by Jiang Zemin. This perception of an accommodating solution to the Taiwan “problem” might be influenced, however, by Washington's planned $18 billion sale of U.S.-made submarines and anti-missile systems to Taiwan. Although Taiwan's pledge to only buy and develop defensive weapons is on record, the country’s successful test-firing of surface-to-surface missiles some time ago has garnered more than a passing interest from China. Reports have noted that these missiles could hit parts of China's interior if fired from...

China put on notice over its currency By Andrew Balls and Scheherazade Daneshkhu in Washington Published: April 17 2005 19:11 | Last updated: April 17 2005 19:11The Group of Seven leading industrialised countries this weekend put China on notice that it must shift to a more flexible currency regime, with finance ministers demanding it take action immediately.  The G7's communique repeated its call for "more flexibility in exchange rates" where it was lacking, to help promote more balanced global growth, and added a demand that "vigorous action is needed to address global imbalances". Officials said there was no discussion of...

...The real puzzle is why required real rates of return are unusually low in the U.S. and abroad (as confirmed, for example, by the inflation-indexed yield of 1.8% offered in the U.K. government bond market). The answer is that we are to some extent still in a post-bubble world, in which there is an excess of global saving compared with perceived profitable global investment opportunities. In the late '90s bubble, the opposite was the case and rapid (in retrospect unsustainable) world investment rates surged ahead of savings, pushing up real interest rates (TIPS yields were at 4% in March 2000...

Central banks are shifting reserves away from the US and towards the eurozone in a move that looks set to deepen the Bush administration's difficulties in financing its ballooning current account deficit. In actions likely to undermine the dollar's value on currency markets, 70 per cent of central bank reserve managers said they had increased their exposure to the euro over the past two years. The majority thought eurozone money and debt markets were as attractive a destination for investment as the US. The findings emerge from a survey of central bank reserve managers published today and conducted between September...

Many of the world's central banks are starting to look to the euro to fill their currency reserves instead of the dollar, a survey suggests.

The dollar could slide still further, in spite of hitting an all-time low against the euro last week in the wake of George W. Bush's re-election, currency traders have said. The dollar sell-off has resumed amid fears among traders that Mr Bush's victory will bring four more years of widening US budget and current account deficits, heightened geopolitical risks and a policy of "benign neglect" of the dollar. Many currency traders were taken aback on Friday when the greenback fell in spite of bullish data showing the US economy created 337,000 jobs in October. "If this can't cause the dollar...

Tokyo stocks plunged Thursday morning following Wall Street's losses. The dollar rose against the Japanese yen. The Nikkei Stock Average of 225 issues was down 111.72 points, or 1.03 percent, at 10,740.75 points at the end of morning trading. On Wednesday, the index fell 75.56 points, or 0.69 percent. The dollar was trading at 106.04 yen at 11 a.m. Thursday, up 0.25 yen from late Wednesday in Tokyo and above the 106 yen it bought in New York later that day. On the stock market, U.S. stock losses largely discouraged early buying in Tokyo. Technology issues such as Advantest and...

Federal Reserve Taking Your Buying Power Away Congratulations to all of you who bought stock, you’ll see that you’re making money today as I write this –it’s just a co-incidence that the Federal Reserve just happened to add $8.75 Billion dollars to Open Market Operations at the same time the market rallied today. Is this the “unconventional means” Greenspan has spoken of using in his attempt to prop up our economy? You bet it is. Welcome to the Third Way – the mix of capitalism and state enterprise. Say good-bye to free markets, not that we ever really had such...

<p>The dollar continued its silent war against Europe yesterday, deepening political turmoil there and raising new demands for the European Union to fight back.</p> <p>Political leaders Italy, France and Germany publicly and privately demanded yesterday that economic steps be taken by the EU's central bank to block the dollar's affect on their weakened economies.</p>

``Our jaws dropped to the floor when we arrived this morning,'' said Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist at Bank of New York, which holds $6.8 trillion of assets in custody. ``Traders won't stop until they see the dollar at $1.20 per euro.'' Contrasting U.S. and European economies make the dollar's fall perplexing, some economists said. Gross domestic product in the U.S. is expected to grow 2.4 percent this year, the median forecast of economists surveyed this month by Bloomberg News. In Europe, the economies of Germany, Italy and the Netherlands are shrinking, and no growth is expected in Japan. ``This...

After years of urging others to reform economies, Washington changes tactics LONDON The Bush administration, unable to jawbone Europe and Japan into helping it stimulate a sluggish global economy, has decided to let its money do the talking. . That, analysts say, is the underlying message in the move by the U.S. Treasury to drop the ‘‘strong dollar’’ mantra that had been a hallmark of U.S. economic policy since the mid-1990s. . Since the mid-90s, the United States has accounted for about two-thirds of global economic growth, estimates Stephen Roach, chief economist at Morgan Stanley, as a strong dollar helped...

"Too big to fail" is the cancer of moral hazard in the US finance system. Many, including myself, have observed that the shrinking intermediary role of banks in funding the economy brought about by the rapid growth the non bank credit and capital markets has increased system risk in recent years. This risk manifests itself only in a bear market. This is now building up to a crisis. Banks have also compensated for their shrinking funding role by moving into equity investing and securitization and trading through their investment banking subsidiaries, not to mention drivative finance and trades. There is...

A Canadian bank robber in a US prison wants his sentence reduced because his country's dollar is worth less than the US currency.Robert Moisescu, from Montreal, says the cross-border dollar exchange rate should apply to his prison term. He has asked Clinton County Judge Patrick McGill to reduce his expected seven-year sentence to four.The 35-year-old has pleaded guilty to robbing a bank in Champlain, New York. He was arrested with the equivalent of £23,000. He says his criminal record is only worth 62% of an American's.Moisescu wrote to the judge: "Taking into account my Canadian criminal record - at current...