US Currency Report Likely to Maintain South Korea as a Watchlist Country

Delayed Exchange Rate Report Likely to Include South Korea's Retention as a Watchlist Country
Hong Nam-ki, Minister of Economy and Finance, Also Predicts "Exclusion from Watchlist Not Easy"

[Asia Economy New York=Correspondent Baek Jong-min] As the United States is reportedly set to withdraw the designation of China as a currency manipulator on the 13th (local time), attention is focused on the possibility of changes to the designation of South Korea as a monitoring country.

The U.S. has yet to release the semi-annual currency report, which was supposed to be announced around October last year. While the dominant interpretation has been that this delay is due to the aftermath of the U.S.-China trade dispute, it is expected that the report will also announce whether South Korea will remain on the monitoring list. The Treasury Department maintained South Korea as a monitoring country in its May report last year.

Our government has hoped to be removed from the monitoring list. Although the monitoring country designation is a lower level than the currency manipulator status, it is assigned when the U.S. deems it necessary to continue closely monitoring a country. If China is removed from the currency manipulator list and included as a monitoring country, the U.S. currency evaluation for both South Korea and China will be the same.

In the report released by the Treasury Department in May last year, it was mentioned that South Korea met only one of the three current evaluation criteria. The report also predicted that if the current situation is maintained at the time of the next report, South Korea would be removed from the monitoring list.

However, it does not seem easy for the currency report this time to meet our government's hopes. After meeting with Secretary Mnuchin during his visit to the U.S. in October last year, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance Hong Nam-ki told reporters, "While we hope to be removed from the monitoring list, I got the impression that realistically, it will not be easy to be excluded this time."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.