No commitment to support dollar

13 April 2012

AMERICA'S Treasury Secretary John Snow has repeated his belief in the need for a strong dollar, but apparently ruled out intervention to stop its current slide.

'Our policy is to continue to emphasise the strong dollar,' Snow said in an interview with cable TV channel CNBC. 'It's in our national interest and I've reaffirmed that over and over again.'

Despite this, Snow has stood aside from the dollar's slide which has pushed up the value of the euro by more than 5% in the past week.

Asked whether the Treasury would intervene in markets in support of the dollar, Snow would not speculate.

'We think the exchange value of currencies is best set in open and competitive currency markets where interventions are kept to a minimum,' he said.

Many analysts believe the US is quite happy to see the greenback slide in the hope it will help exporters to create jobs - of vital importance to President Bush's re-election campaign.

In the past few days, AOL has sacked 450, 2% of its workforce, SBC Communications has axed 4,000 and ChevronTexaco has cut 200.

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