| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立臺灣大學 === 經濟學研究所 === 93 === The main purpose of this paper is to introduce two contemporary issues with regard to international finance as well as comment on the fashionable perspectives on these two issues.
The first part of this paper discusses about “the Debate on the Appreciation of Renminbi .” The Renminbi exchange rate problem has become a highlighted issue on the world’s political and economic stage. From the media outlets, many experts have offered various comments and insights regarding this topic. However, up until now, very few systematic studies or reviews have been performed on these reports. This paper begins by analyzing the market’s view of whether or not the Renminbi will appreciate, and the underlying problems surrounding the currency. The second topic addresses the various assessments of why the Renminbi should appreciate. These include---China’s trade surplus, impact of China’s low-priced export strategy on the United State’s unemployment problem, the changing competitive status between China and Europe, the large influx in China’s money supply caused by drastic increases of its foreign exchange reserves, and the increasing burden of interest rate payments due to sterilization. This paper states that except for the analysis that a fixed exchange rate regime may cause China to lose its independent monetary policy stance, the other viewpoints are not strong or persuasive enough in explaining why the currency should appreciate. In addition, this study also analyzes the reasons from the other side of the argument in advocating why the Renminbi should be kept from appreciating. This encompasses China’s unemployment problems, capital loss of the People’s Bank of China’s (PBOC) foreign assets denominated in Renminbi, the private financial structure, and the possibility of experiencing the same serious recession and other ramifications caused by the rapid appreciation of the Japanese Yen after the Plaza Accord. This paper has discovered that with the unemployment problems associated with low-skilled labor along China’s southeast coastal areas being not too serious, the biggest challenge for the Renminbi in not appreciating, lies in the possible massive transfer of China’s rural residents to urban areas. As for capital loss of the PBOC’s foreign assets denominated in Renminbi, and the Japanese experience, they are not convincing enough to serve as concrete reasons for China’s currency to not appreciate. Finally, except for the fact that the adoption of a fixed exchange rate regime will cause China to lose its control over its domestic monetary policy, this research is capable of counter arguing the fashionable perspectives on whether or not the Renminbi should appreciate. Because the main pressure on the Renminbi to appreciate comes from the United States and major European countries, this issue shouldn’t be regarded as a pure economic problem, but a complicated entanglement of political, diplomatic, and economic associations, where a delicate balance should be struck.
The second part of this paper is “ Issue of New Bretton Woods Regime.”, mainly discusses of the scenario of global current account imbalances, the concepts of New Bretton Woods regime as well as its sustainability. We draw the conclusions as follow. First, New Bretton Woods system (BW2) is composed of two facts: one is the undervalued currencies and the sequential current account surpluses run by East Asia (led by China) after Asian Financial Crisis; the other is the overvalued US dollar in company with the tremendous current account deficit of the US. Second, by purchasing vast dollar-denominated assets bolstered by the accumulation of foreign reserves, the East Asian countries provide low-cost external financing for the US, which reflects the descending long-term rate of US T-bonds, contributing to the soaring dollar asset prices. Third, with the low long-term rate and the flattened yield curve, resources flow out of tradable sectors into interest-sensitive sectors, which in turn lead to the internal distortion in US. Fourth, East Asian countries (especially China) have encountered with significant financing burden, and that may further bring about the problem of higher inflation, bubbles of asset prices and the capital loss of foreign assets in financial system. Finally, with the deficiency of a substantial and powerful institute, it is difficult for members among BW2 to share responsibility for financing for US and collaborate in an appropriate way. In addition, these countries also have incentives to free ride and opt out of the cheap dollar financing cartel. In summary, for the lack of an international coordinating mechanism, we conclude that BW2 is destined to unravel in the long run. In case that all members among BW2 (including the US and East Asian countries) fail to adjust these circumstances of imbalance, they will confront with the situation of severe depression of US dollar and hovering US long-term rate, which may go a step further to evolve a worldwide recession.
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