Dollar’s Rise Rebuffs U.S. Fed’s Critics

One international criticism of the U.S Federal Reserve’s second round of quantitative easing announced at the beginning of last month was that it would weaken the dollar, and that that was the intention of the Fed to boost the U.S.’s international competitiveness. In the event, the dollar has strengthened over the past month, by 5.2% on the Dollar Index. The economic data out of the U.S. has been more positive and sovereign-debt concerns in Europe have undermined the euro, a key component of the Index. Fed officials, if not American exporters, must be feeling quite chuffed.