What Does Trump Want For The Dollar?

It’s not easy to tell if the U.S. is still committed to a strong greenback.

- Katherine Greifeld, with Saleha Mohsin

Since the 1990s the U.S. has explicitly stated that a strong dollar is in the nation’s best interest. Global investors have come to take this stance for granted, giving them confidence that American officials won’t debase the greenback.

But the Trump administration’s chaotic messaging is shaking up these assumptions. A strong dollar is “a beautiful thing in one way, but it makes it harder to compete,” President Trump said on July 26, adding that he hasn’t ruled out taking action to weaken the U.S. currency. His comments contradicted those of White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow, who just hours earlier said the U.S. wouldn’t intervene in currency markets.

The public back-and-forth intensified questions about America’s currency policy. The strong-dollar dogma was introduced by then-Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin in 1995 as a way to bolster foreign demand for U.S. Treasuries, and it helped cement the dollar’s long-standing status as the world’s reserve currency of choice. The pledge to not devalue the greenback encourages international investors and U.S. trading partners to park their cash in U.S. assets.