From Locodollar to Asianyuan: Hong Kong Dollar at a Crossroads

2012 ◽  
Vol 04 (02) ◽  
pp. 94-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor ZHENG ◽  
Roger LUK

After re-pegging the Renminbi (RMB) from the US Dollar (USD) to a currency basket, the Hong Kong Dollar (HKD) is caught between the diverging Chinese and US economies. Disparity between the RMB and USD exchange rates and the HKD, and the disharmony of Chinese and US monetary policies towards Hong Kong have become increasingly acute. Hong Kong is at a crossroads. Should the HKD migrate from the dollar-zone to the renminbi-zone and realign with the national currency, and how? This paper analyses the mismatch and tries to answer the question.

Author(s):  
A. Polivach

Before the world economic crisis the Chinese government restricted the sphere of the Yuan’s circulation exceptionally by the domestic market. Basically, until that time the Yuan was not freely convertible while the Chinese foreign trade transactions were operated with the help of the US dollar. This is a sufficient reason to state that the issue of Yuan’s underestimated exchange rate has no fundamental relevance. However, the crisis forced China to substantially extend the utilization of its national currency in the international settlements. This is especially true in case of mutual settlements with the neighbor countries. So far, presumably, the issue of Yuan’s underestimated exchange rate will, at last, receive a scientific validity only when the Chinese national currency will become fully convertible and the scales of its utilization will become comparable with those of the traditional hard currencies.


Author(s):  
Yue Chim Richard Wong

Both Greece and Hong Kong have unified exchange rate regimes. Greece, as a member of the Eurozone, uses the euro as its local monetary unit. Hong Kong, under the linked exchange rate regime, uses a local monetary unit with its currency fully backed by the US dollar at a fixed rate. As a consequence, both economies have surrendered monetary independence to an external monetary authority. Both have committed to not using currency devaluation or revaluation as a policy tool for stabilizing their economies when they are struck by financial and economic shocks. The only way they could regain monetary independence would be, in Greece’s case, exiting the Eurozone and reissuing the drachma, and in Hong Kong’s case, breaking the linked exchange rate and putting in place an alternative monetary arrangement for issuing the Hong Kong dollar. An economy that has joined a unified exchange rate regime will face situations from time to time when the requirements of global economic integration will be in conflict with the requirements of a political democracy.


2010 ◽  
Vol 55 (03) ◽  
pp. 459-470 ◽  
Author(s):  
CHIN LEE ◽  
M. AZALI

The purpose of this study is to examine the potential linkages among ASEAN-5 currencies, in particular the possibility of a Singapore dollar bloc during the pre- and post-crisis periods by using the Johansen multivariate cointegration test and the Granger causality test. Significant nonstationarity and the presence of unit roots were documented for each currency under both study periods. Using ASEAN-4 exchange rates against the Singapore dollar, the Johansen cointegration test showed that there was no cointegrating relationship during the pre-crisis period. However there were two statistically significant cointegrating vectors among ASEAN exchange rates for the post-crisis period. These findings imply that there is low financial integration before the crisis, but that ASEAN countries are financially more integrated after the crisis. This finding also indicates increasingly role of the Singapore dollar in ASEAN. Therefore, the Singapore dollar may be a possible candidate as the common currency for ASEAN. The analysis is repeated by adding the US dollar to the model. The finding ascertains the influence of the US dollar on ASEAN currencies before the crisis.


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