Yuan-na Bet? Germany, France Add Chinese Yuan To Currency Reserves

Last week, amid “rumors” that China was considering “halting” purchases of U.S. Treasurys, Bloomberg’s Richard Jones and later BofAML suggested the timing seemed awfully convenient.

“The conspiracy theorist in me thinks the timing of this announcement is not accidental, and that the fact that Emmanuel Macron has been in China this week is not a coincidence,” Jones wrote just minutes after the original Bloomberg story hit early Wednesday morning in the U.S.

A couple of hours later, BofAML noted that “the announcement is timely as it coincides with President Macron’s official visit [and] with politics in the Euro Area on a more stable footing, improving macro fundamentals and the end of ECB QE in sight, the EUR as a reserve currency appears to be an increasingly attractive long-term proposition.”

 

Since then, the euro has of course soared, rising for four consecutive sessions through Monday, helped along first by the China story (which dented the dollar as soon as it crossed), then by the “hawkish” ECB minutes, and finally, by ongoing speculation that Draghi will ultimately choose not to extend APP through December once the current extension (which runs through September) expires. Hawkish rhetoric from Ardo Hansson only served to embolden the euro bulls on Monday. Here’s where things stand:

EURUSD2

Well in light of the above, it’s worth noting that earlier today, Bundesbank board member Andreas Dombret told an audience in Hong Kong that Germany will be adding the yuan to its reserves.

“The renminbi is used increasingly as part of central banks’ foreign-exchange reserves — for example, the ECB included the RMB but also other European central banks did so,” he said.

Later, a spokesperson for the Bundesbank told Bloomberg that “the decision for a future investment in Renminbi was made in the summer of 2017.”

Ok, so fast forward several hours and Les Echos reported that the Bank of France is already investing part of its foreign reserves in the yuan. “While the Bundesbank wants to integrate the yuan into its foreign exchange reserves, the Banque de France is already using it as a currency of diversification,” Isabelle Couet writes, adding that while a “major part” of foreign currency holdings remain invested in USD, “diversification can evolve over time based on considerations of liquidity, investment horizon or optimization of return/risk ratio.”

There’s nothing particularly surprising (per se) about any of that considering the yuan’s September 2016 inclusion in the IMF’s SDR and the currency’s increasingly prominent role in the global financial system but again, the timing of these stories is interesting.

One interpretation could be that Europe is setting up to keep a lid on euro strength as EURCNY climbs back towards 8.00 (that’s assuming you’re inclined to believe the ECB would eschew simply jawboning the euro lower – something they’re quite adept at – in favor of a move that, on a crude interpretation, amounts to outright intervention under the guise of “diversification”). An even more cynical interpretation is that everyone is conspiring to fuck Donald Trump, which is all kinds of hilarious.

Don’t forget that there are still questions about the extent to which China is committed to a liberalized FX regime. We were moving in that direction (ostensibly, although we could have a long discussion about what the shift actually meant in practice) starting in August 2015, but tighter capital controls and the addition of the counter-cyclical adjustment factor to the fixing mechanism last summer seemed to suggest that the push towards a more flexible currency is always going to be subjugated to other concerns when push comes to shove.

Last week, the PBoC sidelined the counter-cyclical adjustment factor in an apparent effort to put the brakes on the yuan’s rally against the dollar, a rally which found the currency retracing the entirety of the move lower that followed the relaxation of reserve requirements on forwards in early September. But then, on Monday, the PBoC strengthened the yuan fixing by 0.55% (the biggest increase in three months) to 6.4574, the highest since May 2016, propelling the currency to a two-year high. So you know, who the fuck knows, right? If you want to get even deeper into the weeds, go back and read the note SocGen’s Kit Juckes put out back in September after the rules on forwards were relaxed.

Whatever the case, the Bundesbank and Banque de France news is worth noting and we’re absolutely positive it will come up again sooner rather than later.

 

Leave a Reply to Robert RoarkCancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

5 thoughts on “Yuan-na Bet? Germany, France Add Chinese Yuan To Currency Reserves

  1. So you don’t think that Trump is a big motivator for a shift away from US Treasuries? The first time that the dollar was so quickly trounced, was when Bush 1 attacked Iraq. Now we have a bigger jerk in control of the military, and swaggering around like a fascist racist. That plays well in former nazi country, and Saudi, but not so well everywhere else. So that’s the facts, and until we get something better, it will be interesting to see how long the “smart money” hangs with the dumb ass…fucking down the dollar won’t help the 20% of the voters that actually voted to “make America Great Again” , and when they finally figure out what is happening to them, they will just want to get behind the next phony “christian soldier” who wants to mount a “crusade” against them damn foreigners…

    1. A stable reserve currency needs to have predictable, stable policies behind it. Trump is anything but stable and predictable. I live in the US and have been out of the USD for some months now. The writing is on the wall. The real challenge is what currency to hide out in? I am using loonies now.

  2. The twin deficits (budget and trade) matter but IMO you’re conveniently overlooking the demise of the petrodollar under the clusterfuck Obama. That had brilliantly been the lynchpin of US dollar hegemony for almost a half-century since when Nixon closed the gold window.

    I’ve been pounding the table here and elsewhere for a year that USD was going to zero (figuratively speaking)… but it might soon be time to consider accumulating dollars again when the retail crowd all jumps the other way. Use your TA and key levels to plan your entries, exits and stops accordingly.

    Always better to be lucky than good so good luck.

NEWSROOM crewneck & prints