NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Come out with a lexicon that gives concrete definitions of what all these words and phrases officials are tossing about mean, and you'll do brisk business on Wall Street.
The Fed's "considerable period of time" for instance -- how long was that supposed to be. And what's the difference between the Fed keeping an accommodative monetary policy for a "considerable period of time" and being "patient in removing its policy accommodation."
Last week Fed Governor Ben Bernanke said the Fed could be "patient" on policy "over the next few months" -- which didn't fit in with the market's view of patience at all.
And as if Fedspeak wasn't enough, now we have the Group of Seven finance ministers to deal with. In the communique they released Saturday following their meeting in Boca Raton, Fla., they included the statement: "Excess volatility and disorderly movements in exchange rates are undesirable for economic growth," while also pointing out that "more flexibility in exchange rates is desirable for major countries or economic areas that lack such flexibility."
So what does that all mean? Whatever the finance ministers from different countries want it to, apparently. No wonder they're all "happy" with it. (Definitions of happiness, thankfully, are the bailiwick of guys like John Stuart Mill rather than finance ministers.)
The Europeans, apparently, feel the statement was tailored for them -- the euro is the currency that's been hurt by "excess volatility" (it has risen 45 percent against the dollar in two years time) and a big reason for its rise's magnitude is that Asian countries haven't allowed "flexibility in exchange rates."
The Japanese believe that "excess volatility" is supportive of massive efforts to keep the dollar from falling too hard against their yen -- "volatility" is always the catch phrase they use to justify forex interventions. And even though Japan has spent far more money intervening in the currency market than any other country, Japanese finance minister Sadakazu Tanigaki said "Japan's currency is not one that lacks flexibility."
Meantime, Treasury Secretary John Snow told CNNfn that the G-7 agreed "to allow market forces to set exchange rates, to let the fundamentals of the marketplace drive exchange rate changes." Oh, and speaking of phrases with meanings that are hard to pin down, the G-7 statement is apparently consistent with the United States' "strong dollar" policy.
In the end, nothing's changed.
"Everybody is spinning it in their own direction," said Brown Brothers Harriman foreign exchange economist Lara Rhame. "The end result is the same trends remain in place: dollar weakness, euro strength and the yen strong, but not so strong as the euro."
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