NEW YORK—The Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury did not intervene in foreign exchange markets during the July – September 2020 quarter, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York said today in its quarterly report to the U.S. Congress.
The U.S. dollar, as measured by the Federal Reserve Board's broad trade-weighted dollar index, depreciated 2.9 percent in the third quarter of 2020. The depreciation was driven by a further unwinding of "safe-haven" dollar demand, a narrower U.S. yield advantage relative to other major economies, expectations for relative U.S. economic underperformance, and greater optimism regarding the political and economic outlook in the euro area. The move represented a continuation of the prior quarter's decline, bringing the index back to its level at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dollar depreciation was broad-based, occurring against G10 and most emerging market currencies. Among major currencies, the U.S. dollar depreciated 4.2 percent against the euro, 4.0 percent against the British pound, 3.9 percent against the Chinese renminbi, 3.8 percent against the Mexican peso, and 2.3 percent against the Japanese yen.
The report was presented by Lorie Logan, executive vice president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Federal Open Market Committee's manager for the System Open Market Account, on behalf of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve System.
The full report is available on the New York Fed's website.
