China said world leaders should focus on overcoming economic difficulties together and not play the blame game at this weekend’s G20 summit, just days after Beijing announced greater flexibility for its currency.
The yuan was expected to come up in discussions at the G20 meeting in Toronto, which Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) will attend.
“Under the current circumstances, all parties should display the spirit of tiding over difficulties together ... instead of playing the blame game, instead of imposing pressure,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Qin Gang (秦剛) said.
He said any further changes to the exchange rate mechanism would be an independent decision by Chinese officials, though they planned to make further reforms.
Meanwhile, the People’s Bank of China said yesterday it would expand a trial program on yuan-denominated cross-border trade to encompass 20 cities and provinces and cover trade with any country.
The trial is designed to increase use of the currency in international transactions and possibly make it fully convertible one day. It has been restricted to 365 firms in Shanghai and four cities in Guangdong Province, which were allowed to use the yuan to settle transactions with Hong Kong, Macau and ASEAN countries.
The central bank said the program would expand to Beijing, Tianjin and other cities as well as Sichuan and Zhejiang provinces. It was not clear from the statement when the expansion would start or how many companies would be involved.
China also took the first step toward honoring a vow to let its currency float more freely, as the central bank set the central parity rate — the center point of the currency’s official trading band — at 6.7980 to the US dollar, 0.43 percent stronger than Monday’s rate of 6.8275.
The move was widely seen as a bid to head off rancor at the G20 summit.
In early trading yesterday, the yuan strengthened to 6.7968 on China’s main foreign exchange market before weakening to 6.8200 on domestic demand for the dollar, Dow Jones Newswires said.
Traders said several Chinese banks were buying the greenback, amid speculation the central bank could be encouraging dollar purchases to reinforce the perception that a more flexible system cuts both ways.
“We saw buying from Chinese banks, mainly mid-sized ones,” a Shanghai-based forex trader said.
The 6.7968 level was the yuan’s strongest since policymakers unpegged the currency from the dollar in mid-2005 and moved to a managed floating exchange rate. However, it was still within Beijing’s tight trading band and analysts said China’s pledge did not presage a major revaluation.
The new trading band signaled that the government was making good on its promise for greater flexibility, said Mitul Kotecha, head of global forex strategy at Credit Agricole in Hong Kong.
AIR DEFENSE: The Norwegian missile system has proved highly effective in Ukraine in its war against Russia, and the US has recommended it for Taiwan, an expert said The Norwegian Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS) Taiwan ordered from the US would be installed in strategically important positions in Taipei and New Taipei City to guard the region, the Ministry of National Defense said in statement yesterday. The air defense system would be deployed in Taipei’s Songshan District (松山) and New Taipei City’s Tamsui District (淡水), the ministry said, adding that the systems could be delivered as soon as the end of this year. The US Defense Security Cooperation Agency has previously said that three NASAMS would be sold to Taiwan. The weapons are part of the 17th US arms sale to
INSURRECTION: The NSB said it found evidence the CCP was seeking snipers in Taiwan to target members of the military and foreign organizations in the event of an invasion The number of Chinese spies prosecuted in Taiwan has grown threefold over a four-year period, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said in a report released yesterday. In 2021 and 2022, 16 and 10 spies were prosecuted respectively, but that number grew to 64 last year, it said, adding that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was working with gangs in Taiwan to develop a network of armed spies. Spies in Taiwan have on behalf of the CCP used a variety of channels and methods to infiltrate all sectors of the country, and recruited Taiwanese to cooperate in developing organizations and obtaining sensitive information
BREAKTHROUGH: The US is making chips on par in yield and quality with Taiwan, despite people saying that it could not happen, the official said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has begun producing advanced 4-nanometer (nm) chips for US customers in Arizona, US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said, a milestone in the semiconductor efforts of the administration of US President Joe Biden. In November last year, the commerce department finalized a US$6.6 billion grant to TSMC’s US unit for semiconductor production in Phoenix, Arizona. “For the first time ever in our country’s history, we are making leading edge 4-nanometer chips on American soil, American workers — on par in yield and quality with Taiwan,” Raimondo said, adding that production had begun in recent
Seven hundred and sixty-four foreigners were arrested last year for acting as money mules for criminals, with many entering Taiwan on a tourist visa for all-expenses-paid trips, the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) said on Saturday. Although from Jan. 1 to Dec. 26 last year, 26,478 people were arrested for working as money mules, the bureau said it was particularly concerned about those entering the country as tourists or migrant workers who help criminals and scammers pick up or transfer illegally obtained money. In a report, officials divided the money mules into two groups, the first of which are foreigners, mainly from Malaysia
RSS