One of the Chinese government’s main challenges for 2016 will be managing the renminbi. The currency fell nearly 5 per cent against the dollar last year and heads into January weighted with expectations for more weakness.
There are certainly strong arguments for letting the renminbi continue to fall in 2016 but boosting the competitiveness of Chinese exporters apparently is not one of them.
According to the most recent monthly survey of exporting firms conducted by FT Confidential Research, a Financial Times research service, 56 per cent of exporter manufacturers said they were not worried about the impact of the renminbi exchange rate on their profits. This was below November’s 72 per cent — the highest proportion in the survey’s three-plus-year history — but well above the series average of 31 per cent.