BUCKLE UP FOR THE DOLLAR’S RIDE

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Date: Saturday April 2, 2005 09:36:00 am
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    Buckle Up for the Dollar’s RIDE


    iS the writing on the wall for the dollar? Researchers at
    one big fund manager say it is, but the markets haven’t read along just yet.

    Since the start of March, Bridgewater Associates, a manager of more than $100
    billion of institutional and hedge fund money in Westport, Conn., has been
    issuing warnings in its daily reports. One on March 11, titled “The Breakdown of
    the Dollar System,” said, “As we often say, we’ve seen this movie many times and
    we know the ending.”

    There is indeed a volatile blend of risks surrounding the dollar. President
    Bush’s new budget proposal would substantially expand the government’s debt
    burden in the next decade, potentially raising doubts about the desirability of
    its i.o.u.’s. Some Asian central banks have declared that they will diversify
    their reserves away from dollar-denominated assets. If China decouples the yuan
    from the dollar, it will not need as many dollar-denominated assets to keep its
    currency from gaining value, nor will its competitors for export markets. In
    recent times, long-term interest rates have stayed stubbornly low, making it
    difficult for American companies to attract new investment from abroad.

    These ingredients may just be waiting for the right catalyst. If enough
    people start thinking like those at Bridgewater Associates, the dollar will lose
    value rapidly. There’s no point trading dollars today, after all, if everyone
    thinks that they will be worth less in the near future. Fundamental economic
    factors need not worsen any further; in currency crises, perception very quickly
    becomes reality.

    Bridgewater says it believes that the dollar is already beyond the point of
    no return. To keep the currency at its current value, private investors will
    have to buy more American securities as central banks desert them, said Robert
    P. Prince, the firm’s co-chief investment officer. Before private investors will
    act, they need to see a higher return from American assets, relative to assets
    carrying similar risks abroad.

    Mr. Prince said that those higher returns had begun to arrive through lower
    prices for assets. If an asset comes with a fixed interest payment, say 4
    percent, buying it at a lower price will offer a relatively higher return. But
    these higher returns could cause problems for the economy. Borrowers in the
    competitive market for credit will have to offer higher returns, too, and
    interest rates may rise. “The Fed doesn’t want that, because too much of a rise
    in interest rates will choke off the economy,” Mr. Prince said.

    The alternative is for the assets’ prices to remain the same while the dollar
    loses value. That way, foreigners will be able to buy assets at a discount,
    yielding a higher return, but without putting too much upward pressure on
    American interest rates. (The implicit assumption here is that the assets’
    future returns will not be harmed too much by today’s lower dollar.)

    So, instead of allowing the economy to adjust purely through higher interest
    rates, perhaps causing another recession, Alan Greenspan and his colleagues at
    the Federal Reserve will have the luxury of allowing the dollar to do some of
    the heavy lifting. The numbers? Bridgewater predicts a further decline in the
    dollar of 30 percent, especially against Asian currencies, and a rise in
    American long-term rates of one-half to one full percentage point.

    Not everyone thinks that events will play out this way. “It’s really too
    extreme to be talking about potential crises in the dollar,” said Martin D. D.
    Evans, a professor of economics at Georgetown University in Washington. “Yes, we
    have seen a large movement in the dollar versus the euro in particular, but to
    say we’re sort of on the edge of a precipice isn’t really merited by the facts.
    The premise here, thinking that it’s impossible for the dollar to come back, I
    also don’t buy.”

    Professor Evans said the Fed’s hand would be forced by the rising tide of
    inflation. “The Federal Reserve cares about inflation,” he said, “and they’re
    going to be very reluctant if they start seeing the inflationary effects of the
    decline in the dollar to just sit by and say, ‘But we need low interest rates to
    support exports.’ ” He predicted that the Fed would put the clamps on credit,
    leading to interest rates high enough to attract foreign capital: “We are going
    to see quite a sharp tightening in the United States, perhaps tighter than
    people are expecting.”

    Drastic predictions for the government’s fiscal position may not come true,
    either, even though the White House’s budget would raise the debt-to-G.D.P.
    ratio in 2015 to 37 percent, versus 29 percent under current law. “I don’t think
    it’s big enough to warrant the attention it’s gotten,” Douglas J. Holtz-Eakin,
    director of the Congressional Budget Office, said of the nation’s fiscal
    erosion. “A lot of the dollar’s future will in fact be driven by the other
    determinants.”

    That does not mean the budget can be ignored. Mr. Holtz-Eakin said he
    expected that the government would eventually have to steer clear of a dip into
    the red. “It is unavoidable that we will rein in our spending,” he said,
    “because we are unlikely to be able to tax enough to cover it.”

    Though action by the Fed and a clampdown on federal spending could spare the
    dollar’s blushes, they would both be bad news for the economy. A cutback in
    federal spending will, at least in the short term, create slack in labor and
    product markets. And one of the surest forecasters of recession is a tightening
    of short-term credit by the Fed.

    Congress and the White House have shown no sign that they are serious about
    controlling spending, but the Fed’s policy-making committee may already be
    proving Professor Evans right. After the committee opted to raise short-term
    rates another quarter of a percentage point last week, its statement
    acknowledged that “pressures on inflation have picked up in recent months” and
    asserted its willingness to act forcefully if necessary.

    Whichever way you cut it, we’re in for a bumpy ride.

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