Earlier this month, the US Treasury announced it would postpone the release of its semi-annual report to Congress on exchange policies, which China's critics hoped would name the country as a currency manipulator.
The delay is said to accommodate President Hu Jintao's trip to Washington today to attend an international arms control summit, although the critics were hardly mollified.
In truth though, with or without the delay, do not expect the Treasury to cite China as a currency manipulator. If the Treasury was really serious about China's currency intervention, it would have taken real action already. The Treasury can force China to end the renminbi's peg on the dollar by stopping the sale of its bonds to China. The fact that it has not done so suggests it cares more about financing the budget deficit and the federal government's spending programmes.