Overview
- Washington and Seoul reaffirmed a commitment not to manipulate exchange rates and to reserve market intervention for episodes of excessive volatility, avoiding targeting rates for competitive advantage.
- South Korea will share monthly details of any intervention operations with the U.S. Treasury and provide monthly data on reserves and forward positions, plus annual disclosure of reserve currency composition.
- The joint statement omitted a bilateral won–dollar swap line that Seoul had sought as a backstop for mobilizing its $350 billion investment pledge in the United States.
- Korean officials have cautioned that securing a swap is unlikely and warned that funding the pledge in cash could pressure the won, which has hovered near 1,400 per dollar.
- The agreement did not address concerns around the National Pension Service or removal from the U.S. Treasury monitoring list, with the next report due in November and trade talks still stalled.