China Is Officially a Currency Manipulator

China Is Officially a Currency Manipulator 1

China has been a currency manipulator for years. Everyone knows it. China knows it. The U.S. knows it. Every economist in the world knows it. China has an enormous trade surplus with the world. Typically, when this happens, the value of that currency rises making its exports more expensive to other countries. This, in turn eventually reduces the amount of imports a country makes, thereby reducing the overall trade deficit. China, which requires its citizens to hold their savings in state run banks, uses the large amounts of currency it generates sending exports around the world to ensure that the value of the Yaun never gets above a certain amount. In turn, this both keeps its exports cheap, and prevents any closing of the trade gap between its trading partners. None of this is secret, or remotely new information Trump Calls Out China Currency Actions What is new, is that usually no one says it out loud, and no one ever actually makes it official by labeling China a currency manipulator. So, what does it mean now that China has been officially labeled? Nothing. You see, since China has been doing this forever, and the other countries have known about …

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Is Bitcoin For Real?

bitcoin investing

Recent headlines have started getting people to come out of the woodwork about bitcoin. Go to Market Watch today, and one whole side above the fold is bitcoin articles including one with the headline: “What delivered the best return of 2017’s first half?” – The answer is bitcoin (and ethereum, another digital cryptocurrency). How Is Bitcoin Worth Anything? Alright, this is a little complicated, so stay with me here. First, although you may have stopped thinking about it long ago, American dollars aren’t “real.” In reality, all a dollar bill is, is a special, paper-like fabric, printed with an intricate design in green and black. That’s it. You can’t eat it. You can’t use it as transportation, or for housing, or for anything really. It’s not even good as paper since there is almost no blank space. Dollars exist as currency, only because we as a society agree they represent value. That value is created by a limited supply regulated by the Federal Reserve, for something we give value. In other words, the only thing that makes money valuable is a limited supply that can be exchanged for goods and services. Bitcoin, works in pretty much the same way. Bitcoin …

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What Is Bitcoin Is It Worth It?

bitcoin investing

Bitcoin is a topic that pops up in the news every now and then. It’s also the kind of thing a freelance writer with ADD might get distracted by when he was supposed to be rebuilding the content on an old website. In fact, he might feel guilty for spending so much time looking into it that he would have to write several articles about Bitcoin as a way to make it seem more like work. * Ahem. * What Is Bitcoin? Explaining Bitcoin is a little bit tricky. In essence, Bitcoin is a digital currency. There are no actual coins, only computer data. In many ways, this is not unlike most of the US currency, which exists electronically on bank computers and balance sheets, not in stacks of hundred dollar bills in the basement of GE headquarters. Bitcoin has no intrinsic value. That is, that there is no organization or group that gives it a value. Instead, it is simply a means by which bitcoins are generated in a limited supply. Like anything else, supply and demand can set a price for Bitcoins in other currency, including US Dollars. How you convert Bitcoins to Dollars is that you find …

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