Paddy Johns

Try as they may and moan and groan as much as they like there seems to be little reaction to the Eurozone's repeated complaints about the weak dollar.

"Typically, [FRANCE] continues as most vociferous critic of current Euro strength/Usd weakness. Sarkozy aide Guaino says that Eur/Usd at [1.50] is 'a disaster' for EU industry and the economy. It is the first time 1.50 has been mentioned this week. Recall markets have been increasingly mulling whether that psychological mark is now the top of the EU's pain threshold. Guaino is hinting this could be the case, but again there is no market reaction. Perhaps if a more high profile official, i.e. Jucker, Trichet, had said the same we would have seen the Euro come lower. Meanwhile, France budget min Woerth says the weak Usd is hurting Europe's competitiveness".

This was having already had a previous shot earlier today,

"FRANCE] Sarkozy aide Guaino says the US is 'flooding the world' with Usd, the US wants to cut its debt with a 'depreciated' Usd. Guainao adds that the Usd decline may become 'unbearable' for the Euro and may force a move to weaken the single currency. These are clearly the hardest hitting headlines from the meets so far this week. France is laying some of the blame for Usd weakness at the door of the US admin, but the law of diminishing returns applies here and the more they say the less officials are impacting on the currency. Eur/Usd is unchanged just beneath 1.4970. 09:03 GMT - [OIL] producers (Kuwait latest) continue to maintain that they will price in Dollars but OPEC's secretary general has added a slight different bias. In this respect talking of a move away from Usd's and hinting that a move to the Euro possible, although would take time. Eur/Usd off the lows (1.4950-55) since these comments. Clearly the time factor critical and removing the onus for day traders, but still like BRIC calls to study alternate reserve currencies, there is an underlying interest from oil producers to look for alternate ways to price oil, albeit likely politically motivated"

How much longer before they decide to actually do something and show some leadership instead of just making these futile remarks. Do they really expect things to dramatically change by themselves??

PADDY