Ghosn Wants The Yen Go Lower, Mulally Disagrees

For the U.S. Or any CEO of a U.S. Bqsed multinational to call Japan a currency manipulator is akin to the pot calling the kettle black.

What 'American public' do you know? The rubes of this country don't even know what a Yen is, or what quantitative easing means, and think the expression 'printing money' literally means the government (not the Fed) is printing extra dollar bills (not issuing credit and buying government bonds). The American public is clueless about currency manipulation, but generally very happy when they see their 401k go up every day, even if they have no idea why. Anyways, I've been invested in Toyota and Japanese ETFs for the past month. Bring it on.

I have lived and worked around the world for most of my life. I have been personally impacted by the value of currencies, and I still are. A dollar from TTAC bought me 76 yen last year. Today, it gets me 102 yen. In that regard, I heartily endorse Ghosn's opinions. Having lived and worked around the world, I noticed an oddity: In most countries, they look at their own currency, see it going up and down against other currencies, they say it buys more or less when going on a trip, or when going to a store to buy imported products. In America, people talk about the OTHER currencies, as if the dollar is cemented in place, and as if its the other countries that must be intentionally messing with the rates. This is misguided, and it fosters an environment in which jingoistic remarks such as those of Mulally can thrive. (Mulally is a smart guy. That part of his speech probably was not written by himself. It reads like the work of Steve Biegun, Ford’s silly vice president for international government affairs, and a former foreign policy adviser to Sarah Palin, not the brightest lamp on the international scene.) Currencies are going up and down against each other. They ALL move up and down against each other (unless pegged.) In the last two yeara, the dollar swung by 18 percent against a basket for foreign currencies. Likewise, you rarely hear a foreign automaker complain about the value of the dollar. They usually talk about their own currency. EU makers talk about the higher Euro making exports harder. Japanese automakers talk about their yen, how it nearly killed them and how finally, there is some relief. Nobody accuses the other countries of currency manipulation - that appears to be an American pastime. Sure, the ECB, the Fed, the BOJ, the PBoC all "manage" their currencies to some extent, it's part of their job. To tar others as currency manipulators while doing just the same at home is disingenuous and stupid. Ford should and does know better. Ford conveniently forgets that it had a bastion in that allegedly closed market Japan. The bastion is called Mazda. Ford controlled and managed Mazda. Ford stayed out of the Japanese market only by name. A Ford Focus sold better in Japan when sold as a Mazda3. Ford sold Mazda after carmageddon, because it was one of the few things that still could be turned into cash. I sold a Park Ave apartment because I needed the cash. I won't claim discrimination, just because I no longer can afford one. Mark Fields managed Mazda, he should know better. People deserve better, and should demand less nonsense. Ford usually is a straightforward and no-nonsense company. Biegun's mudslinging makes them look ridiculous,

@DeadWeight There is a big difference between moderate deficits or QE used in the United States and treasury purchasing schemes aimed specifically at altering spot exchange. Furthermore, if you look at the US trade deficit, generally around 5% of GDP, you'll see that the US is simply attempting to protect its own economic sovereignty. Bernanke is not the source of the problem. He is the aggressive US policy-maker who is attempting to shift the negative externalities of currency manipulation onto the manipulators, by exporting inflation and importing capital investment. Most of the currency manipulators are starting to come around, but Japan appears to be lost.

@Bertel Schmitt "This is misguided, and it fosters an environment in which jingoistic remarks such as those of Mulally can thrive." Japan holds as much US debt as China. China was once considered the foremost authority on currency manipulation during the era of the peg, but now the foremost-currency-manipulator-title has fallen to Japan. No amount of ad hominem attacks against American culture can alter economic reality. Japan relies on a strong dollar to make their export economy work, thus, they rely on a strong US economy to back the US dollar. When the US and China squared off in the new millennium, and the US economy started to falter after 9-11, Japan declared that they were innocent bystanders. Rather than bolstering the US economy by working to improve terms of trade, which would have bolstered the dollar in turn, Japan chose to manipulate the dollar-yen exchange by purchasing treasuries. If the US were so inclined, it could reverse Japanese currency-manipulation by purchasing Japanese treasuries en masse, but then Japan would cease to exist, and you would learn about jingoism and currency manipulation the hard way. I think it would be better if you eased your propagandist bluster, and you examined the data and listened to reason.