It will not come as a surprise to anyone who has spent any time reading Zero Hedge (here [9], here [10], and here [11] very recently) but now yet another one of our 'crazy fringe blog' non-consensus ideas - the fact that China is cornered by inflation concerns and unable to ease aggressively - has now been confirmed by none other than the Bank of China and Bank of Korea themselves. As the WSJ reports [12], "The rise in global liquidity could lead to rapid capital inflows into emerging markets including South Korea and China and push up global raw-material prices."
The latest round of easing by the U.S. will increase inflationary pressures for emerging-market economies, Mr. Chen said. "This contributes to a monetary-policy dilemma for Chinese authorities", he added. While markets have looked for signs of more forceful action by China's leaders to rekindle growth, some officials attribute the government's caution to fears of reigniting inflation.
This confirms previous comments by the PBoC that "A domestic policy may be optimal for the U.S. alone. However at the same time it is not necessarily optimal for the world," he said at the time. "There is a conflict between the U.S. dollar's domestic role and its international settlement role."
Via WSJ: Harsh Words From Beijing, Soeul [12]
BEIJING--Chinese and South Korean central-bank officials criticized the U.S. Federal Reserve's latest easing efforts and advocated reducing Asia's dependence on the U.S. dollar.
The comments Thursday, at a joint seminar in Beijing by the two central banks, are the clearest indication yet of a rising backlash in Asia against U.S. monetary policy, suggesting it could speed up the search for alternatives to the dollar as the main global currency.
"The rise in global liquidity could lead to rapid capital inflows into emerging markets including South Korea and China and push up global raw-material prices," said Bank of Korea Gov. Kim Choong-soo. "Therefore, Korea and China need to make concerted efforts to minimize the negative spillover effect arising from the monetary policies of advanced nations."
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Asia needs a "regional core currency" to reduce its dependence on the dollar. China's ultimate goal is for the yuan to be as important as the euro or the dollar, he said.
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The latest round of easing by the U.S. will increase inflationary pressures for emerging-market economies, Mr. Chen said. This contributes to a monetary-policy dilemma for Chinese authorities, he added. While markets have looked for signs of more forceful action by China's leaders to rekindle growth, some officials attribute the government's caution to fears of reigniting inflation.
"On the one hand, China needs to stabilize growth, but on the other hand China is very worried about a property-price rebound," Mr. Chen said.
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The Korean and Chinese economies are also likely to be affected differently by the Fed's easing. The freer flow of South Korea's currency, the won, means sudden rushes of capital can destabilize the financial system quickly, while China's tighter controls means pressures build more slowly.
Mr. Kim of the Bank of Korea is already on the record fretting about the effects of QE3 on Korea. Earlier this month he said that the Bank of Korea may need to take steps to curb the potential influx of liquidity into South Korea.
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"A domestic policy may be optimal for the U.S. alone. However at the same time it is not necessarily optimal for the world," he said at the time. "There is a conflict between the U.S. dollar's domestic role and its international settlement role."
A year earlier, Mr. Zhou argued in an influential essay that the world should move to a multicurrency system, including an increased role for Special Drawing Rights, a synthetic international currency created by the International Monetary Fund.
Mr. Kim said Thursday that China and Korea should consider making the two countries' bilateral currency-swap agreement permanent.
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Both countries should also try to use the yuan and the won in bilateral trade, to cut costs and reduce their reliance on the dollar in transactions, Mr. Kim said. In the long-term, the two countries may consider setting up a won-yuan foreign-exchange market, he added.