Free Trade with America's "exorbitant privilege" goes against the grain. Economics 101. Adam Smith's Supply and Demand doctrine talks of Country X with Commodity X with Currency X. It is the supply of Commodity X and it's demand bought by Currency X that creates a price. If Country Y wanted Commodity X then Country Y would have to change its Currency Y into Currency X to buy Commodity X. That is why a Euro cannot buy anything directly from the US until it is changed into a US dollar. A US dollar cannot buy anything from the EU until it is changed into a Euro. But for Africa, Latin America, Asia minus China and Japan the US dollar buys directly their commodities by passing national currencies and thus violating Adam Smith's market doctrine. So you may talk of deficits in monetary terms, but the US ends up with surpluses of resources obtained at prices outside the market economy because of its "exorbitant privilege" which is not market driven. The one value policy across the world of the US dollar creates the deficits and surpluses as it is not market driven. The IMF fixed cross rates goes against the free market system. The IMF fixed cross rates are based on the exchange rate of the US dollar against the Sterling pound. On the 30th of March 2018, the Sterling pound value to the US dollar was £1 equal to US$1.404. The Euro value against the Sterling pound was £1 was equal to €1.140 while against the US dollar it stood at US$1 to €0.81169. By dividing €1.140 by €0.81169 it gives the cross rates of 1.404. When looking at the North Korean Won its Sterling pound value stood on the same day at KPW1,263 while its US dollar value at KPW900.69 giving a cross rate of 1.403. For the Japanese Yen on the same day the JPY149.067 for the Sterling pound manifested and JPY106.185 for the US dollar giving a cross rate of 1.404. The same picture is seen in the Indian Rupee INR65.06 per US dollar against INR91.36 per Sterling pound to give a 1.404 cross rate. The Canadian Dollar CAD1.288 per US dollar against CAD1.809 per Sterling pound to yield a cross rate of 1.404. The Ethiopian Birr ETB27.56 per US dollar against ETB38.69 per Sterling pound gives 1.404 as a cross rate. The Chinese Reminbi CNY6.272 per US dollar against CNY8.812 per Sterling pound gives a similar cross rate as all currencies across the world do. The question is do all money markets across the world have day in and day out the exact liquidity of Sterling pound and US dollars to reflect the exact exchange rate between the UK and US as reflected in the IMF fixed cross rate system. The reality on the ground is IMF fixed cross rates distort the market and value and thus undermining free trade. It removes value to create and perpetuate debt . The IMF needs to more to Free Floating Cross Rate to reflect the real position of currencies within markets and let currency arbitrage equalise quotations between markets. As for China it is simple. The difference between China and the US is clearly seen in economic policy. A look at what former editor of the Financial Times Mr Crowther wrote in his book"An outline of money" he wrote , " “if a purchaser is someone who want D-marks in order to pay for German exports, the fact that he can get his marks cheap is equivalent to a reduction in the price of exports; it will stimulate sale in exactly the same way as an ordinary depreciation of the exchange rate” (Crowther (1951) p.260).

China has depreciated the price of its products to stimulate inflows, while western economic philosophy has been depreciate currencies to stimulate inflows as echoed by the IMF. China follows "who want D-marks in order to pay for German exports" ..by having "who wants Chinese Rhiminbi in order to pay for Chinese exports" ...Although Chinese firms quote their exports in US dollars payments are settled in Chinese Reminbi to the firms as a result of Chinese foreign currency regulations. Free trade in theory and practice have a huge gap. Take a look at the London Metal Exchange (LME). The LME in a single day handle US$10 billion as 85 percent of the world's base metals pass through it. It is fed by the London money markets that handle US$1.5 trillion plus a day. The LME only allows the US dollar, the Sterling pound, the Euro, the Japanese Yen and in 2015 the Chinese Reminbi as accepted currencies to buy up all of Africa's mineral wealth despite Africa supplying the LME with base metals for centuries. In other words African currencies are banned from purchasing their own production. Is that what Adam Smith said?