KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia has been removed from the United States Treasury Department's currency watch list for major trading partners whose currency and macroeconomic policies require close monitoring by the US.
According to the US Treasury's Office of International Affairs in its report titled "Report to Congress - Macroeconomics and Foreign Exchange Policies of Major Trading Partners of the United States" for November 2024, Malaysia met one of the criteria in both the June and November reports.
"When a major trading partner meets two of the three criteria under the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015 (Act 2015), that partner is added to the watch list.
"Accordingly, Malaysia has been removed from the monitoring list in this report," the report said.
The 2015 Act mandates the US Treasury to report every six months on the macroeconomic policies and foreign exchange rates of its major trading partners.
The Act also requires the US Treasury to conduct a more detailed analysis of macroeconomic policies and exchange rates for each trading partner that meets all three criteria.
The three criteria are: a bilateral trade surplus with the US of at least US$15 billion (US$1 = RM4.48); a material current account surplus of at least 3.0 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP); and sustained one-sided intervention in the foreign exchange market for at least eight months over a 12-month period with net purchases amounting to at least 2.0 per cent of the GDP in the same 12 months.