‘US’ currency manipulation charges reek of hegemony’

Reserve Bank Governor Shaktikanta Das on Friday said ensuring orderly exchange rates is the responsibility of the IMF and not individual countries such as the US. Currency manipulation charges by one nation against another reek of bilateral hegemony, he added.

To ensure that multilateral principles and frameworks for orderly exchange rate and payment arrangements are not superseded by bilateral hegemony, the best way forward is to strengthen existing institutions like the IMF and make them more relevant and trusted, Das said.

Referring to the US Treasury’s semi-annual report judging countries as currency manipulators, he said: “A question that crops up is — why has labelling become a bilateral prerogative when a multilateral institutional architecture exists for the purpose.”

In the more recent period, the term currency manipulator has gained greater focus in the heat and dust of trade wars, he added.

In May, India was removed from the US Treasury’s semi-annual report that contained a “Monitoring list of economies that merit close attention to their currency practices”, having met only one out of three criteria for two consecutive reports.